More food, but is a bigger building needed?

Last year, Foodshare distributed enough food to make 11 million meals…

And yet, that’s just three or four meals per hungry person per week…

It covers just 25% of the need.

Clearly, we must do more and do better!

We have a plan – to provide an additional 2.5 million meals each year!

•       Expanded retail store pick-up – see a description of these plans here

•       Increased capacity at the Hartford Regional Market– see a description of these plans here

•       Expanded volunteer sorting and re-packing at Bloomfield Distribution Facility– see a description of these plans here

Is a Building Expansion Really Needed in order to increase the amount of food donated and distributed?

Foodshare is one of the most efficient and effective food banks among the 200+ food banks in the Feeding America Food Bank Network:

•       Foodshare provides 116 pounds of food per person in poverty per year, compared to the national average of 77 pounds.

•       We distribute 384 pounds of food per square foot and completely emptying and refilling our warehouse 23 times each year, more than twice the national average rate.

If Foodshare is to meet the need, efficiency is not the issue. 

When you look at this graph of Foodshare’s history with food donations, you can see growth all through the early years and then a flattening of that growth in 2002-4, when we had maxed out the space in our previous building.  As soon as we moved into the Bloomfield building Foodshare started growing again.  But in the last year or two, you can see a flattening again – at this point in time, if we are to keep growing to meet the need, we need more space!