Move For Hunger has rescued over 4 million pounds of food that would have otherwise gone to waste. (Image: Move For Hunger)
Traveling through India with a ripped bag and worn out shoes was the first time my perception of waste was challenged. I was thrilled to toss away my holey shoes until the handiwork of thrifty street entrepreneurs caught my attention. They presented another option. For a few rupees, I handed over my soon to be garbage and stood agape as new soles were cobbled and special stitches woven to make my shoes firm and my bag as reliable as ever.
Dan’s shoes were restored to as good as new and saved from winding up in the trash (Image: Dan Ratner)
With a few simple (yet adept) movements my potential trash became a renewed source of value. My perspective was shifted, and so began my upward spiral into the anti-waste movement – with a particularly passionate focus on minimizing food waste.
My Experience With Food Waste Led Me to Move For Hunger
As Director of Operations, I have seen first hand the impact that a shift in perspective paired with a simple solution can create. Move For Hunger is a hunger relief non-profit organization that partners with movers, realtors, and relocation professionals to collect unwanted non-perishable food during a move, and deliver it directly to a local food bank. We provide support to encourage our socially responsible partners to make food collection part of their normal business process.
Here’s How It Works:
Step 1 – Mover is hired for a residential move or a company relocation
Step 2 – During the moving process, the Mover gives the client personalized Move For Hunger materials to educate client about the local need and how to become part of the solution
Step 3 – Client gives the mover any unopened, non-perishable food that would otherwise be wasted
Step 4 – Mover delivers the donated food to a local food bank
Step 5 – Move For Hunger shares & reports the awesome work done by the company and the positive impact made within the community
With this simple three step process, the hard work is taken out of donating food (Image: Move For Hunger)
Move For Hunger transforms moving day into an opportunity to reduce food waste and feed the hungry. During the relocation process, customers that would otherwise toss food away are now encouraged to simply put it aside and have it donated to a local food bank.
Since its start 5 years ago, Move For Hunger has rescued over 4,300,000 pounds of nonperishable food. This success is due to our partnership with over 600 Movers, thousands of Realtors, and major relocation professionals spanning all 50 states and Canada. It’s a noteworthy feat I’m always more than ready to brag about.
Move For Hunger Enables People to Make a Difference
Many people want to help, they just don’t know why or how (and with the how, the simpler the better). The Move For Hunger process is a simple addition to something that already exists. Educating the client on a problem then giving them the tools to make a difference makes the process simple and easy. We’ve seen this with a variety of large (and small) scale initiatives across the country. Once it becomes apparent that people struggling to have food on their table can be helped in a direct and simple way, more hunger fighting opportunities begin to spring forth.
Here are a few events that epitomize the Move For Hunger perspective shift:
Mergenthaler Mover’s : Montana Fill-A-Truck Campaign
Mergenthaler’s began as an actively engaged awesome Move For Hunger mover. However, they didn’t stop there. They decided to take Montana by storm by hosting the largest food drive Fill-A-Truck in the state and have been going strong since 2013! A Fill-A-Truck is when a truck is parked outside of a grocery store with the goal of filling it with food to donate locally. They filled 4 trucks with donated food and were able to collect over 15,000 pounds of food for families during the holiday season!
Real Estate Fall Food Fight
With our home base in Asbury Park, NJ it only makes sense to rile up a bit of good spirited competition among our socially inclined partners. The Real Estate Fall Food Fight was a one month event that vied our Real Estate partners against one another to collect $500 and 500 lbs of food. Our Real Estate Program is focused on education and awareness as realtors educate their clients about the local need and then encourage them to donate during the move. Another example that reminding the client how an easy shift in actions (to donate not discard) can spark massive change.
The Move For Hunger team make it easy for your unwanted food to get to a local food bank (Image: Move For Hunger)
Birthday Cans Instead of Birthday Candles
Xavier, a passionate high school student, has donated his birthday for the past 5 years to raise food for his community. A major benefit of having an incredible fleet of socially responsible movers is that they are willing to donate their time to help support food drives. Move For Hunger can drop off collection boxes before the event, pick-up the donations after the event, take them to a food bank and report back the total amount that was collected. We do all the heavy lifting – and we’re thrilled when individuals and companies take advantage of this to become Hunger Fighting Heroes in their communities!
Get Involved & Start Your Own Food Drive or Fundraising Event
What makes each of these events so powerful is that they encourage a company or an individual to have a perspective shift. Viewing cans as nothing more than added weight to discard is instead transformed into an opportunity to provide valuable nutrition for a neighbor in need. The shift can lead to more food donations (which we love) or even permeate into other walks of life. A company may transform its culture by adding food drives and community engagement as part of their primary success metrics. An individual may be more apt to help knowing that you don’t have to solve the whole problem to make a tremendous difference.
This Change of View Opens Our Eyes to the Value of the Resources Around Us
Simple examples like being more mindful while food shopping, fixing your zipper rather than throwing away your jacket, even squeezing a few extra uses out of your toothpaste tube, are all benefits that come from a shifted perspective. As long as we can continue to find new ways to share that value with others, we’ll make our lives (not to mention the world) brighter and more remarkable. Please share your suggestions on how to add a simple step to a process to add value and benefit others.
Do you know any movers, realtors, runners, or friends that want to get involved? Check us out and become a part of the Move For Hunger Team!
Posting Guideline – Opinions expressed are solely those of the contributors and implies no endorsement by WeHateToWaste. Stories published on WeHateToWaste.com are intended to prompt productive conversations about practical solutions for preventing waste.
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very inspiring read. how do we become a part of the move for hunger without actually having anything to move? how do we participate from the periphery?
Hi Tamanna,
Awareness is key. Spread the word to let friends know that there are simple ways to get involved: host a food drive and/or let your local mover or realtor know they should participate. On the periphery, become aware of your local hunger stats and seek out cool orgs that are finding innovative ways to reduce food waste.
I appreciate the kind words! Hope this helps and thanks for wanting to get moving!
Wonderful Story.
Right on. Thanks, Chris.
Move for Hunger is a brilliant idea because it leverages a particularly good time in which to swoop down and prevent a lot of food waste. Let’s hope it becomes a ‘habit’ on moving day around the world — so let’s spread the word everyone. And let’s hope it will inspire similar types of ideas on other ‘days’. I’m liking Goodwill’s “UberSpringCleaning” for one.
And I’d love to see everyone in America get together with family, friends and neighbors to “leftover pool” on Sunday nites. The possibilities are endless, people! Let’s come up with them, make them happen and start spreading the word.
Excellent posting. Enjoyed the part about your enlightenment in India.
I’m a Realtor in central GA. Please contact me. Thanks!
Carol, that’s great! I’d recommend you reach out directly on the webpage – https://moveforhunger.org/realestate/ Thanks for wanting to get involved. =)
This is a wonderful service and a perfect example of how one can add sustainability practices to an already existing business model without degrading the quality of service of the bottom-line. I wonder what other industries could benefit from a small addition of green services in this way. I agree with Jacquie’s comment that this leverages a particularly good opportunity to swoop in and help prevent waste, and that we should look to create other “days” on which we are deliberately made conscious of our waste. I think every holiday should be associated with a particular waste saving practice.
I wonder if the waste-reducing moving service could be expanded to furniture and anything else in the household that is unwanted. This would of course add costs for the company, but in my experience most people don’t particularly want to waste and will sometimes even pay slightly more to reduce their waste when presented with the opportunity, even if they would not have done so on their own. It’s worth looking into!
Awesome point. It would be great to align major events with a social component. This would enable key issues to become top of mind – which is always a challenging thing.
One answer to your question of adding a green dynamic to a current problem (and a plug) is PareUp. It’s an iphone app that partners with food vendors to provide a profitable alternative to tossing food away. Which means that near the end of a day, when most excess quality food is thrown out, it can instead be promoted for a discount to drive new biz. It’s awesome because:
A. Supports small biz (old shrink into new revenue)
B. Improves access to food (your dollar goes further)
C. Minimizes food waste (in your belly not the trash)
We’re currently based in NYC so if you have an iphone check it out.
Finally, regarding your furniture idea – Great thought. That is actually being currently accomplished by Habitat for Humanity, Restore. Thanks for the thoughts!
I love the Move for Hunger! What is especially cool about this initiative is that it utilizes an existing event to benefit a higher cause. Homeowners or business owners are not required to expend a great deal of effort in order to participate, an important component of Move for Hunger’s success. I think all college campus’ could really contribute to this movement; as students pack up for winter break and summer, they dispose of a great deal of food from personal stores. My school has a collection for old clothes and household items, but should expand to food as well!
I agree that this has massive potential on college campuses! At my university, 50% of students live off campus in apartments and there is a tremendous amount of waste when students leave or move during winter and summer breaks. I would love to bring this sort of move-ment to UVa. An untapped opportunity exists at colleges at the end of each semester because of our meal plans. Most students do not use up their exact “plus dollars” budget on their cards, and this money does not rollover but rather dissolves for the dining hall providers’ gain. At the end of last year, my roommate and I went to the campus convenience store and spent our remaining plus dollars on food to bring along with what was left in our apartment’s pantry to the local food bank. Move For Hunger has reinspired me to step this up on a larger scale on my campus!
Dan, the work that Move for Hunger has done to save over 4 million pounds of food waste is amazing. I often think that if more people were actually personally exposed to poverty and certain conditions in other countries, such as the experiences you described in India, then they would be much more conscious of the value of their food, yet also belongings, which would in turn reduce the grand food waste problem that we have here in America. I recently read a study from the Natural Resources Defense Council called “Wasted: How America Is Losing Up to 40 Percent of Its Food from Farm to Fork to Landfill,” which stated that the average American consumer wastes 10 times as much food as someone in Southeast Asia, up 50 percent from Americans in the 1970s, and that American families throw out approximately 25 percent of the food and beverages they buy. It’s truly a shame how wasteful we are with food when people die from hunger every day, but it’s efforts like those of Move for Hunger that are taking steps in the right direction and making hugely important impacts to help those in need. By the way, I’m a Monmouth County native and spend most of my weekends in Asbury Park (also in the music mix :D) so I can’t believe I’m just learning about your organization now! Cheers, your work is very inspiring!