We’ve made donations our business, so you can focus on yours.
TRIPLE BOTTOM LINE
If donating is good for the planet, your community, and your bottom line, why isn’t every business doing it? Because doing it by yourself can be hard. Copia is here to make it easy, scalable, worthy of celebration, and financially beneficial.
Less waste, more meals
Each year in the U.S., around 149 billion meals worth of food goes unsold or uneaten. Most of this ends up in landfills, where it emits methane, a greenhouse gas far more potent than CO2 and a major contributor to climate change. But here’s some good news: getting this food to people who need it is what Copia does best.
Donations without worry
We know that liability is a concern when it comes to donating food, but the U.S. Federal Government has passed major legislation to protect donors from criminal liability. The Good Samaritan Food Donation Act of 1996 and the Food Donation Improvement Act of 2022, along with Copia’s systems that ensure safe handling and delivery, have you covered.
Meaningful Tax Benefits
The PATH Act, passed in late 2015, ensures that all businesses can receive Enhanced Tax Deductions for donations that meet certain criteria. This means that a donating business can deduct the lesser of (a) TWICE the basis value of their donated food or (b) the basis value of the donated food plus one-half of the food’s expected profit margin (assuming the food were sold at its fair market value). These tax benefits make donating your surplus a huge benefit to your bottom line.
Legislative Compliance
If you’re operating in California, legislation known as SB 1383 mandates that–starting in 2024–many kinds of businesses must donate their edible surplus or face a series of escalating fines. The good news is that if you’re working with Copia you’ll be in compliance with these regulations. Whether your business is a restaurant, hospital, university, grocery store, conference center, stadium, elementary school, municipality, event venue, hotel, caterer, or something in between, we can help.
Any business can use the Copia App to start donating right away
You’ll always get flexible delivery options, a home for your surplus, and a receipt for tax documentation. But if you’re looking for more features, a fully-fledged Copia subscription may be just what you need.
Subscriber Benefits
Tax reporting dashboards
Easy and accurate reporting for quarterly and annual tax filings
ESG reporting
Celebrate your local community impact and Scope 3 emission reductions
Nonprofit recipient testimonials
Hear from the communities receiving your food what impact your donation made
Legislative compliance reporting
Show proof of compliance for local and state regulations such as CA-1383
Scalable program management
Manage your single or multi-unit operations donation program from 1 unit to 1000
Success stories
“Copia has enabled Bloomberg and Sodexo to seamlessly expand our food recovery program and allow us to support multiple non-profits in our local community….In addition to helping our neighbors in need and the planet, we save money with the thousands of dollars in tax deductions Copia helped us track.”
- John Meyers, Sr. Area General Manager, Sodexo
“Implementing Copia at Nemacolin has been incredibly simple. The online portal, as well as the mobile application, are both incredibly user-friendly, enabling us to begin using staff volunteers for packing and delivering the donations. The visualizations and donation impact analytics have been very helpful in communicating information to the leaders at the hotel. However, the most amazing thing about Copia has been the already-lasting impact...these donations are making in the area. The appreciation displayed by these organizations and the people they assist has been unbelievable.”
- Bret Campbell, Director of Sustainability, Nemacolin
“Rudy's North Texas partners with Copia to donate our surplus food to neighbors in need across North Texas. On average, Rudy's shares 662 pounds of food, providing over 550 meals per week to our local communities! Copia enables our team make a strong financial case for doing the right thing. The Copia tax portal makes it as easy as possible for Rudy's to project and claim our Enhanced Tax Deduction, proving that it helps our bottom line to do good.”
- Lauren Trahan, North Texas Franchise, Rudy’s BBQ
“We began using Copia as part of the CalRecycle grant in 2021 and immediately saw the value. Copia's technology gives us the ability to donate on demand and see our forecasted waste to help us identify where we can have leaner operations. We started with our smaller hospital where surplus is more variable and later expanded to our main hospital with daily donations. A key differentiator of Copia is the wealth of data they provide our team that informs our operations and production. We have been able to track surplus to specific stations that allow us to ensure we're staying within our numbers. The team is quick to provide recommendations and solutions whenever needed and we're so glad we're able to have a positive impact on our local community.”
- Santana Diaz, Director of Culinary Operations and Innovation / Executive Chef, UC Davis
Want to stop sending surplus to landfills?
Boost your bottom line, feed your neighbors, stay in compliance, and help the planet.
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