Is it normal for products to sit on shelves for between 4-6 months before arriving to the client?
I have ordered the following Huel bags on subscription:
Arrived: 16 September 2019 (Best Before September 2020) (paid £74.00) [1 x unopened bag]
Arrived: 17 October 2019 (Best Before September 2020) (£74.00) [1 month old by time of arrival] 2 x unopened bags
Arrived: 15 November 2019 (Best Before July 2020) (paid £74.000 [4 months old by time of arrival] 2 x unopened bags
Arrived: 11 December 2019 (Best Before December 2020) (paid £70.00) x 2 unopened bags
Arrived: 10 January 2020 (Best Before July 2020) (paid £70.00) [6 months old by time of arrival] 2 x unopened bags
Arrived: 6 February 2020 (Best Before July 2020) (paid £70.00) [5 months old by time of arrival] 2 x unopened bags
I then stopped all further orders and cancelled my subscription.
I can see with orders 1, 2 and 4 that by the time they arrived I had between 11 - 12 months to consume them (all very reasonable). However with orders 3, 5, and 6 these were already months into their shelf life on arrival, leaving me only 8 month, 6 months and 5 months (respectively) left to consume them!
Naturally I have not been able to consume this amount of Huel within these time periods and I now have a huge backlog of unopened Huel which has now all expired. This is very disappointing, in particular as a loyal customer I continued to order Huel even after moving to Hong Kong from the UK and as a result have been paying an increased amount of between £74.00 - £70.00 to continue the subscription. I have effectively paid for 36 months of subscription for 19 months of possible usage re these three bags.
I am now moving back to the UK in December and do not want to pay to have to have several bags of expired Huel shipped back with me, but equally it seems such a waste to throw this all away (as that would be a terrible waste and money literally down the drain). I have also tried to re-sell these here in HK but due to the expiry date people don’t want to buy it.
Huel team, is there anything that can be done by way of a refund or Huel credit in this case as I ideally I would like to use Huel products in the new year after returning to the UK (but will probably stay clear of the Huel power for a while)?
I just checked the bags I got yesterday and the best before is November 2021. My last batch, July I think, and the best before date was June 2021. With a year’s shelf life, I’ve no complaints.
I dont mind 1-2 months old bags, but for big purchases like I do, they should prioritise new and old bags
I know its very difficult to handle but right now the result is that the 25% of the shelf life of my Huel delivery that I received this month its gone without even opening them yet.
Hey there, thanks for the message, I can see how this is frustrating and no one likes wasting food. We aim to never allow Hueligans to receive anything that has a 3 month best-before or less, but yes sometimes stuff with slightly more than that gets sent out. This is really dependent on the Huel product you order, products that are more popular will have a more regular turnover so you’ll receive them with a longer expiry, but those less popular may have been sitting in the warehouse for longer.
By the sounds of it (and correct me if I’m wrong) you’ve got a regular order of 2 pouches per month and the shortest date product you’ve received is 4 months. That would give you ~116kcal of Huel each day, or 1 400kcal meal every 3-4 days, or 1 400kcal meal a day before your next order, to finish your pouch. To me that seems like a pretty decent time frame to consume all your Huel before it goes past its best before.
As I’ve said, we drew the line at 3 months, as soon as we make that time frame shorter we risk more food waste and write-off (although it’s worth noting short-date Huel isn’t wasted but goes to food charities - still there is risk of write-off). It’s unfortunate, but we think 3 months (in the worst possible case) is an adequate time to consume your Huel.
One other thing is the date is a best before, rather than a use-by date. This means beyond the best before date it is less about safety and more about quality in terms of nutrition and taste. There will be minor degradation of some of the vitamins and minerals and, at the end of the day, it is up to you whether you consume your Huel; there may be a small risk of spoilage. It is not something I can advise you on either way, just explaining the difference between expiry and best-before.
Thanks Simon - appreciate your response however I don’t think it clears up the problem nor helps that much I’m afraid.
The Huel website makes it very clear in multiple places and official forums that Huel has a one year shelf life. I think it’s fair to say that customers ordering their Huel would logically expect that they have 12 months (more or less) beginning from the date they receive the product to consume the packets. In light of this, I think what is stated on the website and told to consumers is quite misleading.
To go from 12 months to 6 is a significant difference and if made clearer I’m sure would impact the way certain customers approach bulk buying and regular orders (and I can imagine a lot of Huel goes to waste). Please can you let me know if it’s made clear to customers on the website / or through the order process that whilst there’s a shelf life of 12 months for the powders, customers may in reality have as little as 3 months to open and consume their packets?
Again, I’d appreciate if anything more helpful can be done here as I do enjoy the Huel products and have recommended Huel to several friends already? I don’t mean to be difficult at all, I just think expectations are a bit misaligned here!
I also sometimes receive Huel bags that have a BBE at an earlier date than the bags I receive later, it’s never a problem though because I go through them at the expected rate so they never reach the BBE.
To be honest I thought I would be receiving 12 month shelf life. That Is what was advertised. However it’s not personally an issue for me as I’m consuming monthly. It just would of added extra value for me.
I think it should be made clear that it is 3 month minimum vs 12 months as this is not actually the case.
Unfortunately there is much food waste because people have learned that a best before date is a use by date.
I am someone who will happily eat food that is months past best before dates (even years) and I have never in my life had food poisoning but many others are conditioned to throw it away.
Just make sure not to eat anything with blue mould. It can be completely harmless or deadly depending on sheer luck . As well as that over a prolonged time it can have a toxic effect on the body. But totally best before means little to me. But I think with Huel as I get it for the nutritional profile it means a lot to me!
The thing is much of the food we eat even fresh is depleted of nutrients. Huel say that food past BB dates will suffer some degradation, yet without proper scientific testing as to how much it is pretty non-conclusive so Huel past BB is probably (and I have no background to base this) better nutritionally than many other things you could eat.
I understand you perfectly, but the result is that I received a product that its at its 75% of its lifetime. This have not happened to me before in 4 years consuming Huel.
One of the selling points for me its the lifespan of the food so it is very frustrating for me, its one of the reasons of why I use powdered food in my daily diet.
I know its difficult to handle but that is the reality.
