How one clever farmer feeds her animals with Costco's rejected fruit

An Enumclaw, Washington woman has gone viral on TikTok for sharing how she receives hundreds of pounds of unsold Costco fruit every two weeks to feed the animals on her family farm. Stefanie Scott, 35, told PEOPLE she picks up around eight large bins or pallets of fruit that would otherwise be thrown away from her local Costco warehouse. Each bin measures about three feet tall and four feet wide, providing over 800 pounds of Costco fruit as animal feed for her 18 cows, chickens, and pigs.

Scott first learned about Costco's program for unsold food around three years ago by chance through a family connection. Her dad knew someone whose wife worked at the Costco, and that employee's contact was going to stop picking up the unsold produce. The Scotts were able to take over those pickups of Costco fruit. Now, the couple hauls the heavy pallets home on a trailer every other week. Costco employees load the pallets with a forklift, and the Scotts return the empty pallets on their next trip.

The condition of the Costco fruit varies from visibly molded to pristine, Scott says much of it looks "completely fine" to eat, according to the platform. Her cows go through an entire three-by-four foot bin of fruit each day in about 30 minutes. While the chickens and pigs enjoy some fruit, the cows consume the bulk of this animal feed. Bananas make up a large portion of the Costco fruit due to Costco's practice of discarding entire bundles if one banana is damaged during the bulk selling process.

Similarly, Costco must toss whole clamshell containers of berries if one piece of fruit is moldy, as it becomes a food safety issue to sell the rest to customers. So the Scotts frequently receive strawberries with one moldy piece mixed in with others that look perfect. Scott clarifies that the "unsold" Costco fruit her farm receives likely never made it to Costco's sales floor in the first place because it did not meet standards for human consumption.

Costco's sustainability commitment states that to reduce food waste, the company "takes a variety of steps to keep food out of landfills, whether it's by creating a new product, donating it to needy people or providing animal feed." While processed items and bread get donated to food banks and shelters, the bulk fruit and vegetables get diverted to farms like the Scotts' for farm uses for unsold produce. The chain's business model selling large quantities at once means more unsold yet still edible food is available.

By taking the unsold Costco fruit, the Scott family prevents over 400 pounds of food from potentially going to waste every week. Their cows relish the tasty, nutritious treats while doing their part to reduce the grocery store's environmental impact. The Costco fruits are much-needed provisions for sustaining the Scotts' farm animals at little cost.