When Azteca Ranch Market recently closed its Denver location, the store owner, Hermine Blau, generously donated 9,000 pounds of food and other products to the JFS Weinberg Food Pantry! Staff members from the Family Safety Net department took several trips to the store and spent about 24 man-hours to empty the shelves.
We received a variety of items including baby food, juice, paper products and cleaning supplies, tortillas and tortilla chips, cereal, cultural and ethnic foods, and more. To put 9,000 pounds in perspective, the Food Pantry averages about 18,000 pounds of donated food each month from various grocery stores.
Shelly Hines, Family Safety Net director, says, “This was a very significant donation. With all of the cuts in federal and state funding, we couldn’t operate at our current level without the generosity of our donors. As the need for food has increased, we have had to think creatively about new sources for nutritious food. This donation included all the quality foods we like to put on our shelves and well as a variety of fun extras that we don’t usually have. We appreciate the generosity of the store and the abundance of the donation!”
The JFS staff helped sort the items and we have already distributed more than half of the food to our Food Pantry clients. Now we are gearing up for our Thanksgiving food drive - look for more details coming soon about how you can help!
-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department
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