Food Drive Toolkit - Amherst Survival Center

26 Pages·2014·21.73 MB·English

by  Mindy Domb

AMHERST SURVIVAL CENTER
FOOD DRIVE TOOL KIT

Amherst Survival Center
138 Sunderland Road, North Amherst, Massachusetts
Tel: [phone] E-mail: [email protected]
www.amherstsurvival.org

September 2014
TABLE OF CONTENTS

T P
OPIC AGE

Dear Food Drive Organizer 3

About Our Food Pantry 4
• About the pantry
• What happens to food donations

Running a Food Drive 6
• Before: Questions to Consider
• Checklists: Before, During and Delivery
• FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions

Planning Your Food Drive 11
• 5 Steps to a Successful Food Drive
• What we need/What we can’t use
• Sample food drive themes
• Raising money

Promoting Your Food Drive 18
• Sample press release
• Sample flyers 20-22
• Sample Facebook and Twitter posts

After your Food Drive Ends 24
• Alert pantry to arrange delivery of your drive
• Weigh In
• Follow up with your community
• Give us feedback

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Dear Food Drive Coordinator,

Thank you so much for taking the lead on your group’s food drive. We truly appreciate
your commitment to fighting hunger in our community, supporting our neighbors, and
helping us to achieve our mission to provide food to residents of Hampshire and
Franklin Counties.

In our community today, there are families and individuals who are finding it harder and
harder to make ends meet and put healthy food on their family’s table. Many families,
individuals, and seniors in our community are food insecure, meaning they do not have
regular access to healthy food. Even more startling is that 1 in every 5 kids in
Massachusetts is at risk of going hungry.

We distribute the food we receive during food drives directly to our neighbors through
our food pantry, sometimes within a week of receiving it. Donating to a food drive is
often a child’s first experience in thinking about hunger in her or his community.
Selecting foods to donate to a food drive gives each of us an opportunity to consider
which foods we would want to receive, if we were in need. In these ways, food drives
build community awareness about hunger and deepen our connection to our
community, as they strengthen our commitment to respond to hunger.

As the Food Drive Coordinator for your group, you are the contact person between your
organization and the Amherst Survival Center. We are here to support you. If you need
anything, please do not hesitate to contact our Pantry Coordinator at 413-549-3968
x104.

After you’ve looked over the materials in this tool kit, set a date and a goal for your
drive, and complete the Amherst Survival Center Food Drive Registration Form online
(http://bit.ly/1m4Edp6).

Some food drives also collect funds. This tool kit includes information on raising funds
for the Amherst Survival Center through food drives. We also welcome drives that
include personal care items, such as disposable diapers, toilet paper and shampoo.

Your participation in this Food Drive helps to ensure that a child does not have to go to
bed hungry, a senior will be able to afford their prescription and still have a meal that
day, and that a single mother will be able to provide nourishment for her entire family.

Thank you for hosting a food and fund drive.
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About Our Food Pantry

Our Food Pantry is available and free to individuals and families who live in the
following 13 towns:
Amherst Granby Pelham South Hadley
Belchertown Hadley Shutesbury Sunderland
Deerfield Leverett South Deerfield Whately
Ware

Any person can come in during our open hours and register for the Pantry. Visits to the
Food Pantry are limited to once per month, where people shop like they would in a
grocery store, making their own choices based on set limits, with a volunteer assistant,
rather than receive pre-packaged bags of food. In this way, the Pantry is considered a
‘choice pantry’.

Monthly distributions include perishable and non-perishable food, fresh milk, fresh
produce, baked goods, and personal care items (when available). The Food Pantry
provides food for up to 3-4 days a week per person in each household, once a month.

The food in the Food Pantry comes from a variety of sources:
• Food drives
• The Food Bank of Western Massachusetts
• Donations from supermarkets, businesses and local farms

Special Pantry Programs
• Senior Mobile Pantry: This program serves seniors in Amherst. Volunteers
assemble and deliver personalized grocery bags once a month to senior
apartment buildings, the Amherst Senior Center, for easy pick-up. Seniors
receive nutritious food to supplement their limited resources.
• Kids SUMMER Boost: This program gives families with school-age children
(ages 5-17) extra child-friendly and nutritious food, a “summer boost”, in July and
August.

Schedule for Our Food Pantry
• Monday, Tuesday, Friday 11:00am-2:45pm
• Thursday 11:00am-6:45pm
• 3rd Saturday of the month 9:30am-11:30am

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What Happens to Food Drive Donations?

FIRST WE WEIGH IT.
When you bring food that’s been collected from a Food Drive, the first thing we’ll do is
weigh it. This will not only tell us how much you’re drive is donating to us, but it also
gives you information you can share in follow-up publicity (on social media, or in emails)
with the people who donated to your drive.

THEN IT NEEDS TO BE SORTED AND ORGANIZED.
If you can pre-sort and organize your food drive (by item), this is a HUGE HELP for us.
If not, after we weigh it, we will need to sort and organize the items.

Depending on the Pantry’s needs, we may shelve it right away for distribution in the
Pantry, or we may store it in the basement.

WITHIN ONE WEEK
Some of your food drive donations will likely be put on our pantry’s shelves. Within one
week after that, a neighbor may have selected it, put it in the grocery cart, and brought it
to their home.
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Running a Food Drive
Thank you! Your generous support enables us to feed our hungry neighbors.

Before: Questions to Consider
Who is the Food Drive organizer? Please provide the Pantry Coordinator with a name, e-
mail, and phone number for contact with this person.

• Have you registered the food drive? (http://bit.ly/1m4Edp6)

• What’s your goal? (for e.g. number of people who will participate or pounds
you want to collect)

• How will you collect the donated food? (in bags or boxes)

• What materials will you need? (posters, ASC donation envelopes, ASC
brochures or fact sheets)

• How will you spread the word? (for e.g. posters, email, social media)

• Will you pre-sort the donated items?

• How and when will you deliver the food?

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Food Drive Checklists

BEFORE THE DRIVE

☐ Appoint a food drive committee to handle the logistics of the drive.
☐ Decide who will serve as the main coordinator and point of contact for the drive.
☐ Decide if you will raise food, funds or both.
☐ Consider setting a food drive goal.
☐ Set a date. For larger drives (> than 500 lbs), you may want to set at least one week
☐ Set a location.
☐ Decide if you want to choose a specific theme. Even if you don’t choose a specific
theme, you may want to consult our top ten list of needs from our website:
http://amherstsurvival.org/donate/food-donations/

☐ Contact Amherst Survival Center’s Food Pantry and fill out a Food Drive Registration
Form.
☐ Think about how you will deliver your donation to the Amherst Survival Center.
☐ Start planning your publicity and how you will get people interested in the drive.
☐ Identify Center materials that you’d like to have available during the drive.
☐ Send out e-mails, social media posts to publicize the drive.
☐ Get a table and other things you may need such as boxes or bags to collect items.

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Food Drive Checklists

DURING THE DRIVE

☐ Place your collection boxes or grocery carts in heavily trafficked, easily visible areas.
☐ Send out frequent notifications about your progress toward your goal by e-mail and/or
social media.
☐ Bring a plastic jar for cash donations
☐ Bring a Food Drive sign
☐ Bring fastening materials to help you attach the sign to a shopping cart, if you’re
doing it by a supermarket.
☐ Bring handouts (food drive “shopping lists”) to distribute to shoppers to use to
purchase items for the food drive (meant to be collected and re-used, if possible)
☐ Bring Amherst Survival Center brochures
☐ Please pre-sort and organize what you collect, bagging similar items together. It’s a
big help if you can do this as you collect the food or before it’s brought to the Center.

DELIVERING THE DRIVE

☐ Call the ASC Food Pantry Coordinator to schedule your drop-off time and location,
and give contact information for the person making the delivery.
☐ Get the weight of your drive from the Food Pantry coordinator and share it with your
members.
☐ Follow-up by sharing your success and thank those who participated.
☐ If you’re bringing donated funds, make sure they’re in an envelope and give them to
the Amherst Survival Center staff person.
☐ Evaluate your drive. What could have been better? How could the Amherst Survival
Center have been more helpful to you? Let us know.
Amherst Survival Center Food Drive Tool Kit (2014) 8
FOOD DRIVE FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions

Q: I want to hold a food drive for what the Amherst Survival Center
needs right now. How do I find out?
Contact our Food Pantry Coordinator at 549-3968 ext.104 or go on our website at
www.amherstsurvival.org to find out our current needs. Then when you have decided
when to hold your Food Drive, register it with our Pantry here: http://bit.ly/1m4Edp6.

Q: Will Amherst Survival Center pick up my collection?
Part of holding a food drive is arranging for the delivery of the collection to the Amherst
Survival Center. You will need to contact the Pantry Coordinator in advance, schedule
a date and time for delivery, and identify a contact person.

Q: Do we need to pre-sort and organize what we collect?
You don’t have to, but doing so would be a great help to the Food Pantry. If you choose
to do so in advance, thanks so much!

Q: I will be dropping off our food drive donation. Where do I take it?
When you schedule the delivery of the food drive to the Amherst Survival Center at 138
Sunderland Road (across from Cowl’s), the Pantry Coordinator will also coordinate your
drop-off location.

Q: Do you accept baby food?
Yes. Unexpired and sealed baby food is accepted and distributed by the Food Pantry.

Q: Do you accept toiletry or other non-food items?
Yes. In addition to food, our Food Pantry also makes personal care items available.
Specifically, our food pantry families have a consistent need for soap, shampoo,
toothbrushes, toothpaste, deodorant, toilet paper and baby diapers. Check with our
Food Pantry Coordinator (549-3968 x104) for current needs.

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FOOD DRIVE FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions

Q: We collected money with our food drive. Do those dollars equate to
pounds?
Absolutely. In fact funds go farther in terms of what we can get and distribute. For every
$0.33 you raise, we can feed one person one meal with a mix of purchased and
donated food. Every dollar you raise helps feed three people. Checks should be made
payable to “Amherst Survival Center”. Fund drives help to increase the amount of food
we can distribute to our neighbors.

Q: Do you have collection bins for us?
No. However, if you need assistance with ideas on how to transport the food for
delivery, please ask the Pantry Coordinator.

Q: Can I use your logo on our marketing materials?
You can use our Food Drive logo! We just ask that you send us a copy of all the
materials you create using our logo. Contact the Amherst Survival Center via e-mail to
receive an updated copy of the logo for your use.

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