It’s the most I’ve had to raise for one cause but I think it’s doable.
Yep. I was hired by the Southwestern Virginia 2nd Harvest Food Bank as their major & planned gifts director. The organization needs about $3 million in yearly operating funds, about $2.5 million for the distribution center facility in Abingdon, Virginia and about $4.2 million for the main distribution facility in Salem, Virginia.
It turns out that distributing free food is an expensive business when you move over 11 million pounds per year and serve over 350 non-profit organizations in 26 counties and 10 cities. You see, when a non-profit of this size gets a shipment of food trucked in… it comes by the tractor trailer load… on pallets… weighing hundreds or even thousands of pounds. You need fork lifts and people who know how to drive them to unload that much free food.
Also, the trucking companies that deliver it do not work for free. Neither do the gas stations where these truck fuel up. One load of food can cost over $5,000 of shipping charges alone.
Then there is a little thing called Health and Safety. The Food Bank gets inspected by three different agencies… the USDA, the Dept. of Health, and the Feeding America network. Passing such intense scrutiny isn’t easy or cheap, especially for a massive warehouse facility.
So, that’s what I’m up to these days. I’m still trying to help a few clients with their joint venture projects online but most of my time is dedicated to achieving the goal of $14 million dollars in 4 years so we can help end hunger in southwestern Virginia. You can check out the food bank website at www.swvafoodbank.org
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