Stop Sending Good Food to the Landfill.

A practical playbook for building a food recovery program that pays for itself — used at Chase Center, adaptable for venues, universities, hotels, hospitals, and corporate campuses.

Most food recovery programs don't fail because the idea is bad. They fail because no one built the business case or the system needed to support it beyond the pilot.

This guide changes that.

Surplus to System is a practical, real-world playbook built from three years running Pass the Plate at Chase Center — a food recovery program that diverted 20+ tons of edible surplus, served nearly 40,000 meals to local nonprofits, and generated more revenue than it cost to operate, in year one.

Inside, you'll get:

• The three barriers that stop most programs before they start — and how to solve each one in the right order
• A readiness checklist to assess where your organization stands before you pitch anything internally
• A self-funding model template with a real-world example and an interactive calculator to run your own numbers
• Field patterns from sustainability professionals at organizations across the country
• A curated partner directory so you're not starting from scratch

This isn't theory. It's the resource I wish existed when I started.

Built by Alyah Kanso, founder of Carry On Consulting and the NBA's first full-time sustainability professional.