Ugly Potato Day is a great event in Surrey where local farms give away produce for free to fight food waste and ensure fewer people go to bed hungry.
Surrey’s Ugly Potato Day
Ugly Potato Day began in 2022 at Heppell’s Farm which is a massive farm in Surrey that has produced large quantities of food (primarily potatoes) for over a century. The event now happens at the Cloverdale Fairgrounds.
Ugly Potato Day aims to lessen food waste. Supermarkets don’t buy produce that’s deemed “ugly,” whether due to blemishes or imperfect shapes. So plenty of farms end up throwing away food that is perfectly edible and nutritious.
Over its first two years, Heppell’s Farm hosted 14 Ugly Potato Days at different times of the year. Shoppers showed up to the farm and could load up their bags with free food, including potatoes, carrots and squash.
The event soon got so big that it outgrew the farm! Now Ugly Potato Day takes place at the Cloverdale Fairgrounds, with 12 farms contributing food to the event. It’s estimated that over 10,000 people attend the event when it happens, and there can be as much as 150,000 pounds of produce!
Where and When
Since the second half of 2024, Ugly Potato Day happens at the Cloverdale Fairgrounds, which is a little under an hour’s drive from downtown Vancouver. The address for the fairgrounds is 17905 62 Avenue in Surrey.
Last year the event took place three times. It took place at Heppell’s Farm for its final time on June 8th, 2024. In that same year, the first event at its new venue, at the Cloverdale Fairgrounds, was on August 3rd. The next was on October 19th.
October 19th, 2024, was designated as National Ugly Produce Day by the event’s organizers and its partners, which includes the Greater Vancouver Food Bank. Farms in other parts of Canada and the United States hosted similar events on the same day as part of a grassroots movement.
The October 19th Ugly Potato Day ran from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm last year. It was free to attend.
The event will likely happen again in 2025. Exact details, however, are to be confirmed.
What to Expect
Ugly Potato Day is like a Farmers Market, except everything is free! Large containers of food are opened up and everyone is welcome to show up and fill their bags with fresh, local (and yes, ugly) produce. There are potatoes, beets, cabbage, carrots, apples, bread, squash, parsnips and more.
There’s usually a DJ playing music and a couple of food trucks on-site as well. The event can get crowded, but more than enough food is provided for everyone! Ugly Potato Day also benefits local food banks. It’s a great local initiative!
Ten Servings Co.
Tyler Heppell spearheads Ugly Potato Day. He created the organization, Ten Servings Co. to fight against food waste and thereby decrease the number of people in BC who go to bed hungry.
Since its founding, Ten Servings has donated over 10,000 servings of food to local food banks, run Ugly Potato Day, and helped create similar events in other places in North America.
Other Information
Visit the Ten Servings Co. website for more information about Ugly Potato Day.
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