Did you know that between 30-40% of the food supply in the United States goes to waste every year? In 2019, the EPA estimated that 66 million tons of food was wasted in the retail, service, and residential sectors. This food is often perfectly safe to eat but gets thrown away for various reasons, including getting too close to the sell-by date. Sustain-a-Plate founder Franklin Taylor (MBA ’24) recognized this issue and decided to be a part of the solution.
“Living alone, I often wasted food I would’ve loved to eat. Knowing that is a ridiculous waste of money, I wanted to do something about it, and from there, Sustain-a-Plate was born.” Taylor says his concept first started as composting but has developed into a system of dynamic pricing and expiration date tracking that can help commercial grocers and retailers boost profits and move products rather than throwing them away. Sustain-a-Plate alleviates the labor costs it takes to track expiration dates manually, allowing retailers to easily discount products nearing their expiration dates to expedite sales and keep food out of landfills.
Franklin knew he wanted to be an entrepreneur when he entered the MBA program at WashU’s Olin Business School, but didn’t have a clear vision of what that meant. “My biggest challenge as a student founder has been going against the grain of what a standard MBA student is supposed to do,” he said. “…As the program progressed, I was pulled in so many directions and even had a really solid internship last summer that I received a full-time offer from.” This led to a dilemma: should he take the job, the financial stability, and planned-out life that it would provide, or should he do the “crazy thing” and pursue his startup?
Ultimately, he decided to turn down the offer. “By considering the worst that can happen and if I would regret this decision later in life,” he explained, “I came to the conclusion that this is exactly what I want to be doing, even if the path is unclear.”
It was a bold choice, but one that is already paying off. Taylor spent the summer working on Sustain-a-Plate full-time with his CTO, Jason Ti, through the Skandalaris Launchpad program, where they received the support of a paid intern to help propel the venture forward. The team landed their first customers over the course of the summer, and now they are seeing the Sustain-a-Plate concept working in real time for people who have the exact problem they are working to solve.
When asked his advice for students considering starting their own venture, Taylor replied, “Always believe in yourself! Then, execute your ideas. Everyone has a great million-dollar, billion-dollar idea. 365 days out of the year, it comes down to execution. Can you actually do what you say you do and then do that very thing? Don’t worry about scalability, and don’t worry about anything besides the next step that will progress your venture. There are frameworks etc., but at the end of the day, you just have to solve your customers’ problems. You need to first believe in yourself for them to believe in you. Stay true to yourself and continue to be the awesome person you are, and people will follow you.”
Franklin is living his own advice, as is evident by his decision to devote his energy to a company he feels passionate about. He could have taken a safe job with a big company, but he chose to pursue his dream and help make the most positive impact on the world that he can, and he credits his time at WashU for helping him make the decision to take the road less traveled. “My time at WashU has impacted me tremendously,” he said. “The entrepreneurship program and classes here are top-notch. Not only are Doug Villhard and II Luscri amazing to learn from, but they also brought in heavy-hitting speakers who have had a tremendous impact on how I see the world and motivated me to pursue my passions. My classmates have been an incredible support system as well. Overall, WashU helped me feel confident in betting on myself and going full time into pursuing Sustain-a-Plate.”
You can keep up with Sustain-a-Plate’s mission to eliminate food waste online at: sustainaplate.com | Instagram | LinkedIn