It can be hard to look at a dumpster full of unsold food and wonder why some of it wasn’t given to people who could use it. With so many families struggling to afford groceries, throwing away edible food can seem like an obvious waste.

Many grocery stores do donate food, but getting surplus groceries from a store shelf to a person who needs them isn’t always as easy as it sounds. Refrigeration, food safety rules, staffing, transportation, and the timing of donations can all get in the way.

Here are some of the reasons grocery stores still throw away food that might otherwise be useful.

Donating Food Takes More Work Than Tossing It

From a store employee’s point of view, throwing something away can take just a few seconds. An unsold item gets removed from the shelf, placed in the proper waste container, and the employee moves on to the next task.

Donations take more steps.

Someone has to sort the food, check its condition, package it if needed, record what is being donated, and store it until the organization collecting it arrives. Perishable food may also need to stay refrigerated during the entire process.

That can be tough for a store that is already short on employees or dealing with a busy closing shift.

Meat, dairy, prepared foods, and some produce can be particularly difficult. These foods need to stay at safe temperatures from the store all the way to the organization receiving them. If proper refrigeration can’t be maintained, the food may have to be discarded.

Food Safety and Liability Are Still Concerns

Grocery stores have a responsibility to keep unsafe food away from customers. That responsibility doesn’t disappear just because the food is being donated.

Federal law, including the Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act, provides liability protection for certain food donations made in good faith. Still, stores may worry about what could happen if donated food makes someone sick or if employees aren’t following the right procedures.

Food also needs to be stored properly, packaged appropriately, and checked for signs of spoilage. Those tasks take training and time.

Expiration dates add another layer of confusion. A “best by” date is often about quality rather than safety, but shoppers and employees may treat the date as a firm cutoff. That can lead to food being removed from shelves even when it may still be perfectly usable.

Stores Feel Pressure to Keep Shelves Full

Walk into a grocery store near closing time and you’ll probably still see plenty of food on the shelves. That’s intentional.

Customers expect to have choices, whether they’re shopping in the morning or making a late-night grocery run. Empty shelves can mean disappointed shoppers and missed sales.

Stores often order extra inventory to reduce the chance of running out of popular products. The tradeoff is that some of that food won’t sell before the store needs to remove it.

Appearance also matters. A bruised apple, oddly shaped vegetable, dented box, or package with a small cosmetic flaw may still contain perfectly good food. Shoppers often reach for the best-looking products, so stores remove less attractive items before they become even harder to sell.

Money Plays a Role, Too

It may seem like donating food should always cost less than throwing it away, but that’s not necessarily the case for a grocery store.

Disposal can be quick and inexpensive. A donation program requires employees to sort food, keep certain products cold, organize pickups, and coordinate with charities or food rescue groups.

There are tax benefits available for qualifying food donations, but those benefits don’t erase the labor and transportation costs involved.

For a small grocery store with limited staff, finding the time to manage donations can be especially difficult. A store may want to keep usable food out of the trash but still struggle to make the process work on a regular basis.

This doesn’t mean stores prefer to waste food. In many cases, they’re dealing with a system that makes disposal easier than donation.

Technology Is Helping Cut Down on Waste

Some grocery stores are finding better ways to deal with surplus food.

Improved inventory software can help stores predict how much food they are likely to sell, reducing the amount they order unnecessarily. Some retailers also use automated forecasting systems to account for things such as weather, holidays, local buying habits, and past sales.

Another tactic is lowering prices as food gets closer to its sell-by or best-by date. A package of meat, bakery item, or produce that might otherwise be thrown away can sometimes be sold at a discount before it becomes unsellable.

Food rescue groups also play a major role. They can collect surplus groceries and get them to food banks, shelters, community organizations, and other groups that can distribute them.

Some Food Simply Can’t Be Donated

Not every item sitting in a store’s back room can go to a food bank.

Food that has spoiled, been contaminated, damaged, or stored at an unsafe temperature needs to be discarded. Donating something that could make someone sick defeats the purpose of a food rescue program.

The challenge is figuring out which food is still usable and getting it to someone in time.

That is why reducing grocery store food waste isn’t just about telling stores to donate everything they don’t sell. Better inventory planning, clearer date labeling, food rescue partnerships, discounted pricing, and reliable pickup systems all have a part to play.

Grocery stores have already found ways to keep some surplus food in circulation, but plenty still gets thrown away. Making donation easier and less costly could help more of that food reach people instead of ending up in a landfill.