Coop Scoop Blog
Ending A Year of Giving with Our Most Successful Fundraising Drive Yet: $20K for The Food Pantries!
On January 22, Honest Weight Food Co-op will present a check worth $20,000 to The Food Pantries for the Capital District. The funds are the result of a two-month long donation drive held at Honest Weight, where shoppers were invited to donate a dollar or more to the cause and to sign their name and a message of hope on a large sign at the store’s exit. By the end of December, the board was brimming with wise, enlightening, and humorous messages.
This effort was Honest Weight’s third end-of-the-year fundraising drive for The Food Pantries, and their most successful yet. With totals of just over $10K in 2017 and 2018, the cooperatively-owned grocery store set a modest goal of $10K at the start of the campaign. Right away, talleys showed over $2,000 in donations each week and indeed, by December 31st, the register drive totaled out at $19,439.57. To round out the donation, Honest Weight added an additional $560.43 from the Honest Weight Community Fund, an endowment started in 2008 for the purpose of annual giving.
All of the money raised will be put towards meals for the hungry and programs to improve food access in the Capital District, where over 97,000 people, including more than 30,000 children, are food insecure. The $20,000 donation is equivalent to about 120,000 pounds of food.
“Our coalition of more than 65 food pantries relies heavily on volunteers, sponsors, and partners to help us to fulfill our mission of working together to feed the hungry in our community, “ says Natasha Pernicka, Executive Director of the Food Pantries for the Capital District. “Currently, more than 1 in 10 of our community members are struggling with food insecurity. Support from partners like Honest Weight Food Coop and their shoppers is very important. It is with this support that we were able to feed more than 57,000 individuals and families (including over 22,000 infants and children) and provide approximately 3.2 million meals to our neighbors in need in 2019. We are truly inspired by Honest Weight’s amazing staff and the generosity of their shoppers!”
Honest Weight Food Co-op, an independent community-owned grocery store with a focus of offering natural, organic, and locally-sourced food and products, is committed to donating 5% of its annual net income to local non-profit organizations. The donations are allocated through a variety of programs, many of which are managed by Honest Weight’s Outreach Coordinator, Amy Ellis.
“Community outreach is one of the ways Honest Weight fulfills its mission of giving back to our community,” offered Ellis. “Along with our free in-store classes, our outreach team travels to schools, libraries, and partner organizations to teach cooking and nutrition classes to kids and adults. We also provide donations, in the form of gift cards, food, catering, service, and cash donations to about 150 organizations every year, all of which work in the same local communities we do.”
The non-profit and the grocery store have more than just a neighborhood in common. Both seek to make healthy food accessible to their communities and the Greater Capital District. At Honest Weight, shoppers will find a collection bin for a non-perishables to accept food donations for The Food Pantries year-round. The grocery store also donates bread and produce to The Food Pantries and other local organizations weekly. The two businesses plan to continue expanding their partnership in 2020, with collaboration on education, programs, and fundraising that will work towards meeting their mutual goals.
Honest Weight Food Co-op is open to the public seven days a week. Additional information on Honest Weight can be found online at www.honestweight.coop or by calling 518-482-2667. The Food Pantries for the Capital District can be reached at 518-458-1246. More information, including food bank locations, can be found online at www.thefoodpantries.org.