Since 1993, the Letter Carriers’ Stamp Out Hunger® Food Drive has been the largest national one-day food drive held in the U.S., allowing customers to place bags of non-perishable food items by their mailboxes before their letter carriers’ regular pick-up time, which the carriers will collect for delivery to a local hunger organization.
This year, letter carriers have partnered with Amp Your Good to offer an exciting new donation option: For the first time, customers can also donate fresh fruits and vegetables to the drive. Beginning on May 1, anyone can visit www.StampYourGood.com to select and purchase the fresh food items they want to donate. Amp Your Good will then deliver that food to Stamp Out Hunger–approved hunger organizations in New York City and San Francisco.
Letter carriers’ decided to offer an online donation option as a means to help increase donations and in response to input that they’ve received from hunger organizations looking to increase the amount of fruits and vegetables they receive.
Amp Your Good’s online Crowd-Feeding system makes it easy for people to donate food items that match the needs of people facing hunger. According to Patrick O’Neill, CEO of Amp Your Good, “People get pretty excited at the idea of donating fruits and vegetables to help those who are struggling.”
NALC Director of Community Services Pam Donato said, “We see the online option as a great way to engage people about our food drive and provide them an opportunity to donate fresh produce items to the Stamp Out Hunger.”
The Letter Carriers’ Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive takes place each year on the second Saturday in May. This year, that’s Saturday, May 14. On that day, postal customers can simply place bags of non-perishable food items by their mailboxes for collection by their local letter carriers. Online donations through Amp Your Good can be made May 1–31, 2016.
The 2015 food drive gathered 70.6 million pounds of food, bringing the grand total to more than 1.4 billion pounds since the annual national drive began in 1993. As an official partner, WhyHunger supports this effort to get more nutritious food into the hands of those that need it. For information and to make a food donation click here.
