Starbucks to donate all leftover food to needy

Coffee giant Starbucks intends to donate all of its leftover food to people, which means it would donate every single unused food item from all its 7,600 US stores.

The coffee giant already donates all its unsold pastries, but according to chief Howard Schultz, expanding the generosity to perishable food items needed a certain amount of planning.

"There are a lot of regulations, and I would say for the right reasons because the municipalities are just trying to make sure the food is safe to eat," Schultz told CNN.

Under a new partnership with Feeding America, refrigerated trucks would collect all perishable food items and give them to those in need.

And according non-profit Feeding America, a one in seven Americans struggled with hunger, which was a lot.

With the initiative, the Seattle-based coffee chain joins the ranks of other big name food brands like Chipotle, Olive Garden and Yum! ,brands, which also donated unsold leftovers.

Starbucks plans to donate over 5 million meals to the needy, by the end of 2016.

''Our people just felt so badly. And this has been going on for quite some time. And so we started doing our homework– municipality by municipality,'' Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz said in an interview with CNN's Poppy Harlow.

 ''I'm always trying to educate myself on the current social issues of our time,'' Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz told Harlow. ''And one of them is the fact that there are so many people in America that do not have the next meal to eat.''

According to Starbucks spokesperson Erin Schaeffer, while Starbucks had tried to donate food in the past, it did not have a ''consistent process to do so.''

''The challenge was finding a way to add fresh or perishable food, like breakfast sandwiches and salads to the donation pick up while preserving the food's quality throughout the process,'' Schaeffer added.