Who is Nicole Iwalowo? Greggs worker fired from the branch in Romford after her footage went viral on TikTok
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TikTok/@lord.nicc566
When a video showed mountains of food going to waste at the bakery business went viral on TikTok, a Greggs employee was fired. A Greggs employee was fired after filming mountains of food going to the trash on a daily basis. Nicole Iwalowo was sacked from the Romford store in east London after her TikTok video went viral. After a month of working there, the 21-year-old said she felt ‘terrible’ and ‘guilty’ watching so much thrown out. Her video depicts her packaging up leftover produce such as freshly prepared sandwiches, donuts, and yum yum. During the November 27 video, there were six bin bags full of food stacked onto a metal cage.
‘There are people hungry all around the world, and all of this is going to waste,’ Ms. Nicole Iwalowo added. We squander stuff like that every day [while working at Greggs]. ‘We do ‘good to go bags,’ but that’s only around two bags, and the rest goes to trash.’ That day, I just felt compelled to document it because I felt terrible about throwing away so much food.’ The sandwiches are created fresh every day with fresh ingredients, and that day we tossed out [a lot of] sandwiches – roughly five bags full of baguettes, spaghetti, and yum yums. We discard [a lot more] products every day at the bakery on a regular basis.
@lord.nicc566 Watch me get fired for this 😵💫😂 #foryourpage #foodwaste ♬ masquerade x mtr – jovynn
‘The sandwiches weren’t going bad, there were simply too many of them – it’s corporate policy that sandwiches are produced fresh every day, so they had to be thrown away for some strange reason.’ They should donate it to charity or just distribute it to destitute people. There is a hostel nearby, as well as a large number of homeless individuals. ‘I simply felt horrible, and I didn’t want to work there after that.’ Ms. Nicole Iwalowo went on to say that she was dismissed a few weeks later after being sent home from work the next day. However, her tweet sparked hundreds of furious comments and complaints to the bakery behemoth on social media.
This food is distributed through charitable partnerships and sold at reduced costs through outlets, retailers, and the app ‘Too Good To Go.’ However, the statement concedes that not all of the stores it owns have these arrangements in place. It further adds that any unsold food is returned and processed into sustainable energy in stores where none of the agreements are in place. According to the popular business, “all unsold food is completely diverted from the garbage.” Ms. Nicole Iwalowo, who worked 20 to 24 hours a week at the supermarket for a month, claimed she watched bags of newly produced, unsold food go to waste every day.
‘They stated they send some to charity, but I’ve never seen a charity truck come to the shop, so what’s to say it’s going to any of the other stores?’ Staff is not permitted to take any leftover food home, due to corporate policy. ‘Apparently, they used to let you take some home but people were selling it so now you have to pay for it or it goes in the rubbish,’ says one employee. Ms. Nicole Iwalowo
She said that her manager immediately put her on probation and that she was dismissed a month later via a zoom meeting shortly before Christmas. ‘The next day at work, they informed me I couldn’t work,’ she explained. They let me get ready for my shift as everyone stared at me, and then the large boss called me into the conference room and told me, “you can’t come into work until further notice.” ‘ “Watch me be fired,” I put on my video, and they responded, “you were being a bit spiteful about that, so you knew what you were doing.” ‘ I thought it was a little unfair that they didn’t offer me a second opportunity and instead forced me to erase the video.’ ‘We have a variety of programs in place to assist in decreasing food waste across our shops, including the redistribution of unsold food to community organizations and charity,’ said a Greggs spokesperson. We are always trying to increase the quantity of unsold food given away to people in need, and we remain dedicated to ending food waste.’
