$2 Million
Dollar Grant from Philanthropic Arm of Olive Garden Parent
Company Will Help Increase Access to Nutritious Food in Communities
of Color
25 Food Banks Have Received Refrigerated
Mobile Food Pantry Vehicles Since January
2021
ORLANDO,
Fla., Sept. 15, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Darden
Restaurants is helping Feeding America® add refrigerated
trucks for 10 member food banks to support mobile pantry programs
and food distribution in communities with the highest need. Through
a $2 million grant from the Darden
Restaurants, Inc. Foundation, and support from partners Penske
Truck Leasing and Lineage Logistics, each food bank will receive a
26-foot vehicle that can transport 12,000 pounds of food at a time,
and will also receive $52,000 to use
for food and other needs.
Food banks receiving this gift include:
- Arkansas Foodbank (Little Rock,
Ark.)
- Chattanooga Area Food Bank (Chattanooga, Tenn.)
- Community Food Bank of Eastern
Oklahoma (Tulsa,
Okla.)
- Food Bank of the Rio Grande Valley (Pharr, Texas)
- Golden Harvest Food Bank (Augusta,
Ga.)
- Kansas Food Bank (Wichita,
Kan.)
- Roadrunner Food Bank (Albuquerque,
N.M.)
- Second Harvest Food Bank of Southeast
North Carolina (Fayetteville,
N.C.)
- Second Harvest Food Bank of the Big Bend (Tallahassee, Fla.)
- Toledo Northwestern Ohio Food Bank (Toledo, Ohio)
"Across our company, we have a higher purpose to nourish and
delight everyone we serve, and that includes the communities where
we operate our restaurants," said Rick
Cardenas, President and CEO of Darden Restaurants. "We're
uniquely positioned to help in the fight against hunger, and we're
proud to continue helping more Feeding America member food banks
increase access to nutritious food for people who need it
most."
The Need
The rate of inflation has caused grocery
prices to spike by more than 13% over the last year, and families
are turning to local food banks for support. Communities of color
continue to be impacted by food insecurity at a disproportionately
higher rate.
In addition, local food banks are also dealing with the impacts
of inflation, resulting in higher costs for food and the
transportation needed to acquire and deliver food to their
communities. Feeding America helped identify food banks serving
communities of color with disproportionately high levels of food
insecurity to receive a truck to help increase their mobile food
pantry capacity.
"As food prices remain stubbornly high, the nearly 34 million
people who experienced food insecurity in 2021 continue to face a
tough choice, whether to purchase food or pay for other basic
needs, such as electricity or medicine," said Claire Babineaux-Fontenot, CEO of Feeding
America. "This Hunger Action Month, we're grateful for the
collaborative efforts from Darden,
Penske and Lineage in continuing to provide member food banks with
refrigerated trucks that will help reach more communities and
provide millions of meals to individuals and families across the
country."
Responding to the Need
Darden and the Darden Foundation have been
partners with Feeding America for more than 10 years. This donation
marks the latest effort in Darden's ongoing commitment to help fight
hunger, and it follows two previous donations that provided 15
refrigerated trucks for food banks located in: Birmingham, Ala.; Columbus, Ga.; Detroit, Mich.; Ft.
Worth, Texas; Huntsville,
Ala.; Jackson, Miss.;
Jacksonville, Fla.; Memphis, Tenn.; Monroe, La.; Orlando, Fla.; San
Antonio, Texas; Shreveport,
La.; Tampa, Fla.;
Theodore, Ala.; and Tyler, Texas. Within the first year of serving
their communities, these trucks have conducted more than 7,000
mobile food pantry distributions and helped provide more than 27
million meals.*
This work builds on Darden's
ongoing Harvest program, which donates unserved, nutritious food
from Darden's family of
restaurants to local nonprofits. Since this program's inception,
Darden's team members have
'harvested' more than 130 million pounds food — amounting to more
than 108 million meals.*
*According to the USDA, 1.2 pounds of food is equivalent to
one meal.
About Darden Restaurants and the Darden
Foundation
Darden's family
of restaurants features some of the most recognizable and
successful brands in full-service dining — Olive Garden, LongHorn
Steakhouse, Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen, Yard House, The Capital
Grille, Seasons 52, Bahama Breeze
and Eddie V's. For more information, visit www.darden.com.
The Darden Foundation works to bring to life our spirit of
service through its philanthropic support of charitable
organizations across the country. Since 1995, the Darden Foundation
has awarded more than $100 million in
grants to non-profit organizations such as Feeding America,
National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation (NRAEF) and
American Red Cross.
About Feeding America
Feeding America® is the
largest hunger-relief organization in the
United States. Through a network of more than 200 food
banks, 21 statewide food bank associations, and over 60,000 partner
agencies, food pantries and meal programs, we helped provide 6.6
billion meals to tens of millions of people in need last year.
Feeding America also supports programs that prevent food waste and
improve food security among the people we serve; brings attention
to the social and systemic barriers that contribute to food
insecurity in our nation; and advocates for legislation that
protects people from going hungry. Visit
www.feedingamerica.org, find us on Facebook or
follow us on Twitter.
View original content to download
multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/darden-restaurants-helps-feeding-america-member-food-banks-in-10-states-add-mobile-food-pantries-to-serve-communities-facing-hunger-301625710.html
SOURCE Darden Restaurants, Inc.: General