Cliffs of Moher/Galway:  Give us your observations on what stood out to you during your tour of the Cliffs of Moher and the City of Galway.

During our exploration of the City of Galway, I noticed that people on the western coast are much different from people in Dublin.  It is a much more relaxed culture and people are much more polite.  There were also many more locals who were spending their time shopping and walking around Galway, as today was a national holiday in Ireland.

FoodCloud: In preparation for your site visit to FoodCloud, this organization has a deep commitment to supporting the local food system in Ireland.  Just from reading the article, it resembles an organization in Pittsburgh, 412 Food Rescue, which supports the local food system in Pittsburgh through an emphasis on reducing food waste through food recovery and distributing excess food to local food banks.  Based on your quick review of the article on FoodCloud, identify one commercial opportunity and one commercial challenge they are addressing in their efforts to support local food systems.

FoodCloud has multiple opportunities to expand all throughout Europe.  They not only can help with name brand grocery stores in Ireland, but due to the close proximity to other countries such as England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, they can easily branch out throughout this part of Europe to continue to reduce food waste.  However, their largest commercial challenge is funding.  They rely on donors for a lot of funding, and if they want to continue to expand and grow, it will be a challenge to do so without a lot of support from businesses who want to see a reduction in food waste.

Questions For The Site Visit:  Finally, acting as members of consulting teams that might choose to write a group paper about the commercial opportunities and challenges connected to FoodCloud, what specific questions do you have about the business model for FoodCloud that relate to our course material (Triple Bottom Line and sustainability, market segmentation, maximization versus shared value, etc.)?  Give us a specific question for tomorrow’s visit.

If they do not receive any more funding through donations from large companies like Nestle Ireland, will FoodCloud be able to achieve their goal of becoming a financially stable organization with an earned income business model?