Felix FLEX goes from strength to strength taking home FDF award
The Food Life Extension Programme won for it’s work transforming short-dated ingredients into long-life products for charities such as soups and smoothies.
Published 25 September 2026
Felix has been named as the winner of the Outstanding Community Partner Award at the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) Awards 2026.
The food redistribution charity was honoured for its ground-breaking Food Life Extension (FLEX) programme, which transforms short-dated ingredients into long-life products for charities such as soups and smoothies.
By collaborating with major growers, food processors, and manufacturers it delivered significant environmental and social impacts. In 2025 it:
- Manufactured 618,461 units, providing 641,552 meal equivalents.
- These were distributed to 4,133 charities supported across 99% of the UK
- Diverted 374,290kg of CO2e by preventing edible surplus food from entering landfill.
Winning the Outstanding Community Partner Award is a testament to the impact of the FLEX programme and the innovation shown by the team at Felix. The programme was developed in response to the large quantities of short life produce and bulk catering packs we were being offered. Much of this food was unsuitable for the organisations we work with and so at risk of going to waste. By transforming it into nutritious meals, we are creating highly sought-after products that are incredibly valuable to the community organisations we supply. The long-life products allow many of them to save money and reinvest those savings on other services such as advice, activities, social connection or other practical support.
— Richard Smith, Director of Innovation at Felix
Felix was up against, Ferrero UK – The Joy of moving programme; KP Snacks – Everyone In: Transforming Communities Through Cricket and NNEdPro Global Institute – Mobile Teaching Kitchen Intiative (MTKi).
The charity was also a finalist in the Food Waste Initiative category with work of Alliance Food Sourcing.