FoodCloud - Thursday, 12 February 2026

On a wet and windy evening 20 members and some guests went on tour to Broomhill to the office and Dublin warehouse of FoodCloud.  This memorable event was facilitated by our member Cathriona Hallahan with help from Laura Magahy and Fiona Tierney. Cathriona has worked with the FoodCloud for several years as a Board member and is the incoming chair.  Founded in 2013, Iseult Ward met Aoibheann O’Brien meeting as students in Trinity College Dublin. They shared a mutual love of food and a distaste for food waste, which led to the project that would later become FoodCloud. 

Today the FoodCloud have scaled two core solutions for surplus food redistribution - their technology platform and 3 warehouse Hubs in Ireland. They also outlined their education and advocacy leading the way on food loss and waste prevention and their plans to grow and scale their Community Kitchen.

FoodCloud's impact is really startling. This team talk about food as hundreds of thousands of meals and meal equivalents. Their near-term ambition is to deliver a billion meals and meal equivalent.  They partner with leading retailers nationally like the Musgrave Group, Aldi and Lidl and internationally with retailers such as TESCO, restaurants, food companies, non-profit organizations, governmental actors, and business communities across Ireland, the UK, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Kenya. Members toured warehouse, stocked high with excellent produce that is surplus but never "waste". Iseult and Aoibheann have also emphasised the importance of governance, transparency, FoodCloud was awarded a 2024 Good Governance Award, is SORP compliant and a registered charity. They work nationally to distribute European Social Fund (ESF+) food programme which delivers food to community organisations who in turn support the most marginalised in our society- emphasising the need for this solution to survive the next EU budget discussions. 

The FoodCloud team put tremendous effort into the IWF-Ireland visit. We toured the enormous warehouse and had a pre-dinner reception at their very cute food truck.  The team turned their offices into a pop-up dining room fit for glamorous awards ceremony. Experienced chef Janice Down prepared an excellent three course meal for us, and we were also served their own tasty apple juice which was a big hit with members. Janice spoke of her work, the need for constant creativity to work with changing ingredients and plans for the community kitchen and the impact she sees from delivered nutritionally balanced meals on a daily basis.  We also heard from one of Maria Logan from Darndale Community Kitchen and the vital link FoodCloud and her team of volunteers make by weekly food distribution in that community.

IWF Ireland does not endorse particular organisations, but several members asked where they could donate privately.  If you wish to do so, this is the link to https://food.cloud/donate#donate-now