OVERLAND PARK, Kan. - Saturday was the last day for the Fill the Fridge campaign, which helps provide perishable food items that help feed hungry people in the community.
Throughout the week tens of thousands of pounds of perishable food items have been collected and tens of thousands of dollars in monetary donations.
As of Saturday afternoon, Harvesters Community Food Network had already collected about 50,000 pounds of food through Fill the Fridge.
Volunteers made it easy for shoppers, handing out lists of most needed items.
“People are bringing it out here to us and we’re going to put it in the truck so we can deliver it to people who don’t have food,” said Girl Scout Mia Carson.
“This is product that our clients at our agencies don’t get all the time,” said Gene Hallinan, communications director with Harvesters Community Food Network.
That’s what makes the Fill the Fridge campaign so special.
41 Action News spent the week partnering with Price Chopper to help Harvesters collect perishable food items like fresh oranges, milk, butter, cheese and yogurt.
“These are the things that people ask for, they really want this,” said Hallinan.
Harvester’s serves 26 counties and nearly half the people they feed are children.
The perishable food drive helps give school age kids nutritious meals.
“It’s health food and that’s what we want people to be able to have,” said Hallinan.
People from the community were happy to help.
“We’re fortunate and we can help so we do,” said Mari Reynolds.
Reynolds and her friend each donated an entire cart of food, coming to the store precisely for that reason.
“It does my heart good to be able to give something like this when we know they can’t buy it themselves,” said Reynolds.
Along with food, people donated more than $30,000, a single dollar provides 3 meals to someone in need.
“It makes me feel really good and happy because there’s a lot of people in the world that can’t buy things like this. So it makes me feel really good that we can donate to them,” said one of the girl scouts.
The donations collected through Fill the Fridge will help serve hundreds of thousands of nutritious meals in our area, thanks to the generosity of the community.
Harvesters refrigerator truck will be at the Price Chopper in Overland Park on the corner of 151st and Metcalf until 7 p.m. Saturday.
If you can’t make it out, you can donate online at http://www.kshb.com/about-us/fill-the-fridge
