Hi, I'm Sophie, and this is Gerry, and we'd just like to thank you all so much for coming this evening. We can't wait to get started, and we have a really exciting idea for you today.
Soph and I First heard about Local Genius on our course at uni.
We started thinking of ideas that surround us as students & residents (of B&H)
As we came up with ideas, we realised that there’s already a lot of services available for people like us. So then we switched our thinking to the more vulnerable people in our society.
We thought about the elderly, disabled & the homeless.
We did some research and discovered that Brighton has the second highest homeless count in the UK. One in Sixty - Nine people are homeless.
We thought - what do these people need? And how could we help?
-	To start, a roof over their head
-	Healthcare
-	Possibly counselling
-	But most basic of all, a decent meal every day
So we looked at the statistics surrounding food waste, and we were just shocked to discover that over 4000 tonnes comes from restaurants and eateries in Brighton alone.
And so we looked up existing projects who are starting to use this waste to feed the homeless, but we felt that they are only really scratching the surface.
Consequently there’s a huge gap in the market, and that’s food waste directly from people’s homes.  We haven’t been able to find anyone who has come up with an ongoing, sustainable, and realistic solution to this problem.
Today, we are proud to present - (slide change) - Produce Package!!!
Produce Package is a way to distribute surplus food from homes to the homeless
(Using produce package containers, each with a unique barcode, we will able to)
------------- Logistics -------------
Quite simply, registered households receive a produce package. When donors have surplus fruit or veg, they store it in a package and leave it outside for collection. In the morning, one of our chilled vans will collect the excess produce form the homes in Brighton. After being sorted, it is then redistributed to the homeless in partnership with other organisations in the local community.
------------- Technology -------------
So, you might consider how technology is involved.
(signup/login screen)----
Once a household is registered and logged in to our app, they’re presented with their dashboard.
(dashboard, barcode scan, food submission)
Now, all produce packages have a unique barcode. When a user has food to throw away, they use the app to scan the barcode and proceed to load the contents of the package by tapping on the quirky produce icons.
(statistics / tracking)
A large part of why we believe produce package will work is because users aren’t donating their time or money. Unfortunately with a lot of charity, it’s hard to see the change that happens with your donation. That’s something we wanted to change. By inputting what produce you are donating, we can track who has given what food and where it is going. This allows us to give personalised statistics such as the number of mouths fed. Everybody wants to see change in Brighton and Hove, but few hold the resources to make change. We want to get the entire community involved.
------------- Legal -------------
How can we ensure this food is safe? Well, for some professional advice, we talked to Tom Walker who is the food safety officer for Brighton and Hove. Tom told us that food would have to be quality checked. So, we decided to implement a short food safety questionnaire into the app. Every time a donor submits a produce package, they must check their food against the questionnaire to ensure it meets standards. Using the barcode we are already tracking the food from its source to destination.  So, in the situation that we would have to look up where an item of produce has come from, this enables us to do so easily.
Finally, food must be stored under 8 degrees. To accommodate this we would employ the use of chilled vans.
------------- Marketing Strategy -------------
How will we raise awareness?