November 20, 2016

Boston-based agtech startup, Spoiler Alert, announced the closing of a $2.5 million seed round led by Acre Venture Partners. Other investors include the Fink Family Foundation, Valley Oak Investments, LaunchCapital, Fresh Source Capital, and FTW Ventures.

Founded in 2015, Spoiler Alert’s agtech technology platform acts as a facilitator for agribusinesses and food producers to find connections through which they can either donate of sell their unsold surplus food or organic matter.

In November of last year the startup launched its online Marketplace – a business to business and business to non-profit communication portal, which more than 200 organization across the New England region have joined to date. Since its launch, the Marketplace has maintained a consistent growth rate for membership of 15 percent per month.

Additionally, earlier this year Spoiler Alert launched Enterprise – a subscription-based service that assists businesses in fully capitalizing upon available tax deductions for donating food, including item-level traceability and advanced reporting dashboards that can give insight and provide traceability for a business’ level of food waste, community impact, and potential tax benefits.

Not a Wasted Opportunity

“Every year, upwards of 40 percent of the nation’s food supply is wasted – reducing bottom lines, squandering opportunities to drive down food insecurity, and damaging the environment,” said Spoiler Alert co-founder and CEO, Ricky Ashenfelter in a company statement.
Up to 40 percent of food produced, processed, and transported in the U.S ends up never being eaten, according to Feeding America, and more food finds its way to landfills and incinerators than any other type of municipal solid waste. This loss represents a fiduciary hit of $218 billion to U.S. farmers, businesses, and consumers each year, according to ReFED.

Food Dive reports that 94 percent of diverted food waste is used as animal feed or applied to farmland, and that 100 percent of major food companies that were surveyed by the Food Waste Reduction Alliance reported that they were investing in four out of five methods of food waste reduction. However, Spoiler Alert’s technology and platform is situated to give these companies an added incentive in reducing lost revenue and improving their tax base.

“By enabling businesses with unsold inventory to connect in real-time with networks of non-profits and discount buyers, we see an opportunity not only to increase profitability, but also to drive greater collaboration between food manufacturers, distributors, retailers and farms with the 50,000 nonprofits committed to ending food insecurity in America,” said Ashenfelter.

Acre Ventures sees this inefficiency as an opportunity for profit while also having a positive effect on the entire food value chain.

“This is a strong team with a big vision, and we couldn’t be more excited to leverage our industry experience and support them with their growth,” said Sam Kass of Acre Venture Partners and the former White House Senior Policy Advisor for Nutrition Policy.

Spoiler Alert plans to use the funds from this round to support the expansion of its team, expand its Marketplace platform to new geographies, and to strengthen its presence in the food manufacturing, distribution and retail spaces.

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Lynda Kiernan