This month we are celebrating an incredible Move For Hunger milestone: delivering 40 million meals to communities in need. This success is only possible thanks to our incredible community of movers, members, partners, and donors. We truly couldn’t do it without you!
We were founded on a simple idea: donate your food when you move. Over the last 15 years, we’ve expanded from one family moving company to a network of 1,200 transportation partners, including many of the world’s leading relocation management companies, and more than 2,500 multifamily apartment communities nationwide.
Just 12 short months ago we rang in 30 million meals; in that time we’ve been able to bring 10 million more to the plates of those in need. While food insecurity is on the rise, it’s more important now than ever to continue our fight against hunger.
Want to learn more about how we got here? Let’s hear from our Executive Director & Founder, Adam Lowy:
In the last year we’ve been able to deliver a record 10 million meals, how has the Move For Hunger community shown up to make this happen?
“Over the past year, Move For Hunger has delivered more than 10 million meals to families struggling with food insecurity. We've done this because you have shown up. Whether it's our moving companies going out, picking up food every single day, delivering it to local food banks and pantries.
Our multi-family partners, ensuring that every resident gets the opportunity to donate their food when they move. Organizing food drives and fundraisers, our relocation and mobility partners who are out there ensuring that donation and food recovery is top of mind all the way through that process. To our volunteers, our board members, we are so grateful for your support. To everyone that has liked us or followed us on social media, you're amazing. And to our partners that have stuck with us from the very beginning through Covid, today and beyond, you are the ones that made it happen.”
What new ways are you impacting communities today than you weren’t [15] years ago?
"So what's new now is we are working to recover food in more ways than ever before. When we started moved for hunger 15 years ago, I thought that we were just going to be picking up food from people moving and delivering it to food banks, which, by the way, was amazing.
But that translated and evolved into recovering food with relocation management companies, almost 3,000 multifamily properties across the country, and today working with farmers and CPG companies and distributors to pick up literally truckloads of food that would otherwise go to waste. It's been really exciting to see this evolution, and there's a lot more on the horizon to go."
What makes Move For Hunger's mission so unique?
"I think the thing that has always resonated with people about our mission is that it is super simple, right? Ultimately, what we've done from the beginning is ensure that folks who have food to donate have a really simple opportunity to get that food donated. We get it picked up. We get it delivered to a local food pantry, whether it's with our movers or relo partners, multifamily partners, CPG companies, it's the same thing.
We don't overcomplicate things. Now, what we do is actually very complicated, and crazy from a logistical standpoint for everybody else. You don't see all of that. You just see that what moved for a hunger does is deliver food to communities. And that's something I think we can all get behind."
Now that we’ve delivered 40 million meals, how are we going to deliver the next 40 million?
We just hit 40 million meals, which is a big deal, and you're asking what's next? Let's be like Simone Biles and take a beat right? We worked our whole lives, in this case, just 15 years, but we worked 15 years to get to this point. We want to celebrate 40 million, but we also are thinking forward to the next 40 million, 50 million, a hundred million meals.
So how do we get there? Honestly, we're just scratching the surface. It took us 15 years to get to 40 million meals, but this year alone, we'll do another 13 million meals. And we're going to continue to see that grow, because we are looking to optimize the work that we're doing. We're getting more efficient. We're getting more strategic. We're bringing on more partners so we can continue to do what we do at scale, and that's really exciting."
What’s next for Move For Hunger? Any exciting opportunities ahead?
"What you're going to see is a lot more collaboration from Move For Hunger in the year ahead. Collaborating with our food bank partners and pantries. Collaborating with other food recovery organizations. Working with more freight logistics, cold storage companies to build out more infrastructure for us to recover from, and ultimately working with more partners.
If you want to get involved, whether it's you personally or your company or your organization, reach out. We would love to work with you."
See The Journey
Fuel The Next 40
Want to take action and become a part of our Move For Hunger community? Help us deliver the next 40 million meals by hosting a food drive, booking your next team building event, or becoming a sustaining donor.
