Grocery stores have just about any food to please your appetite. Need Bread? Go to aisle five. Or if you’re looking for some apples, just take a stroll through the produce aisle. Once you grab your items, head to the check out and you will be eating in no time at all. This is how most people go about stocking their shelves and feeding themselves.
But what if you could leave your wallet at home and grocery shop for free? Would you be interested? All your fruits, oats and veggies are available for free but there is one minor detail to remember — this food may not be not found on any shelves, between aisles, stacked nicely or kept refrigerated.
To find this food, one must descend to the alleys late at night and slip around back to the of the most disgusting places imaginable — the dumpster.
There are people who take no shame in dumpster diving for free goods. These Freegans scour grocery dumpsters in search of edible food that has been thrown away.
According to Freegan.info, “Freegans are people who employ alternative strategies for living based on limited participation in the conventional economy and minimal consumption of resources. Freegans embrace community, generosity, social concern, freedom, cooperation and sharing in opposition to a society based on materialism, moral apathy, competition, conformity and greed.”
Melanie Sears, a Toledo-area resident and psychology student at Eastern Michigan University began practicing freeganism last December.
“Diving is always an adventure; you never know what you will find,” she said.
Sears, who is also a vegan, was able to support her diet last spring semester at EMU almost completely by dumpster diving.
“It’s funny because you can almost be picky,” said Sears. While Sears was explaining the vast variety of food that can be found when dumpster diving. “The most common items are apples, bananas, bread and pasta,” she said.
Much of the discarded food may only be one day past the sell date or has a minor package damage and that is why it ends up in the trash, she said.
“The food that is gathered is perfectly edible with maybe a dent in the can or tear on the box,” said Sears. “It’s good that the thrown out food can be used rather than go to waste.”
Freegans are not the only people who find dumpster diving to be beneficial and interesting. Over 30 years ago, Professor William Rathje of The University of Arizona started a project which studied the trash people discarded so as to examine patterns of consumption.
The garbage project began in 1973 and has birthed the term, Garbology. Rathje and his colleagues discovered that people consume and throw out far more than they actually realize.
Garbalogy has been useful in the tracking of what cultures discard and consume as well as the solving of crimes.
Since the initial study, the Garbage Project has expanded from dumpsters to landfills across the country.
Food Not Bombs, a movement where food is distributed for free to anyone who is hungry often employs Freegan techniques to obtain food. Toledo area resident and acquaintance of Sears, Terijian Bryer helps out with Food Not Bombs in Toledo.
“With dumpster diving, you can not only help yourself but the community by providing food for people who really need it,” he said.
“In the present days of consumerism, products are discarded without any thought and often go to waste,” Bryer said.
“The amount of things and food people throw away is ridiculous,” he said.
Bryer has found everything from cartons of cigarettes to crates full orange juice and even claims to have a friend who once stumbled upon a working video game system.
“The cigarettes maybe a little old, but they’re free,” he said.
But not everyone is excited about freeganism. Bryer said that some stores lock up their dumpsters at night to prevent diving. A select few even pour chemicals on the food so as to make the food inedible.
Toledo law states that garbage picking is technically trespassing and the best way to obtain refuse food would be to speak with the store manager, which would probably take away from the adventure associated with dumpster diving.
“It’s a lot like treasure hunting,” said Sears. “And the people you meet while dumpstering are almost always a very nice and interesting people,” said Sears.
“It would not be uncommon to stumble onto a dumpster late at night with five to ten people scavenging for anything from cigarettes to bread,” she said.
What does it say about a society that throws away enough edible food to foster a Freegan movement? The movement has proven that it is possible for people to survive on the goods and products that people often consider worthless and thrownaway.
The Freegan’s represent a cause that is noteworthy for the community as a whole. What does it say about a society that casts aside enough usable resources to nourish a group of free treasure hunters? The Freegan’s take advantage of the plentiful things that most people find waste-worthy.
Next time you throw your unopened canned soup in the trash, remember that someone else may still find the soup suitable for dinner.
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