Franklin Food Bank End of Year FUNdraising

Each month we look forward to our visit from the Franklin Food Bank. This month, Franklin Food Bank Development Director Allie O’Brien returned to share some important information.  Franklin Food Bank's Theme is Fundraising with a Capital F-U-N 2024 has been a year of epicness. In addition to serving an additional 35% of families in just the first half of the year over the previous year, (that number genuinely only goes up year after year) they’ve rolled out new programs that help our community to reach and maintain self-sufficiency. This includes formalizing wraparound services such as cancer screenings, and health screenings (including A1c, blood pressure, and cholesterol). It’s also offering vaccines, providing navigation for SNAP and other government programs such as WIC, and holding nutrition workshops - called "Flavor Workshops" with nutrition discussions and healthy cooking demonstrations. This is in addition to all their regular food-based programming happening in their pantry, in their warehouse, and at their satellite distribution locations. This is one of their prouder accomplishments this year, and there have been many, this includes the satellite pantries they opened in September in two neighboring schools. These satellite pantries help to deepen the impact in schools and amongst families with children, which experience food insecurity at a higher rate. The financial burden for families has not decreased even as inflation has come down recently. Grocery prices are still exceedingly high. And even New Jersey, which is by all accounts a state whose policy focus has been on helping struggling families, is often too expensive for many of our neighbors to handle. To address all of these burdens for families, the Franklin Food Bank holds an annual fundraiser at the end of the year. This fundraiser is both online and by mail. It is the most impactful fundraiser for the organization annually, affording them a chance to not only directly request support from their community of treasured donors but also the chance to spread awareness about the story of their year. If you haven’t been a supporter yet, now is a great time to join. Your investment will directly and immediately impact the local community. The Franklin Food Bank will celebrate their 50th birthday next year and we have some exciting things in store. However, before they start celebrating their accomplishments, they hope to end this year with more supporters than they did last year, and that starts with you. We also talked about their Flavor Workshop this Friday, go to FranklinFoodBank.org to learn more. Check out my chat with Allie here… [audio mp3="https://magic983.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2024/11/ALLIE-OBRIEN_1730817933_.mp3"][/audio]