The purpose of the campaign is to enable groups across the US to run food drives that raise REAL Food - fruits and vegetables, locally grown produce, whole meals and other healthy food - instead of what traditional food drives raise - cans and boxes of non-perishable, processed food. It's a way for food drives to get people struggling with hunger get the food they really need, healthy food that many lack access to.
PRLog - Aug. 4, 2015 - MENDHAM, N.J. -- Food Day and Amp Your Good have teamed up to disrupt how food drives work - with the goal of having them raise healthier food. There are millions of traditional food drives each year supported by tens of millions of people. These drives support more than 90,000 food pantries, soup kitchens and shelters in the United States and the 50 million food insecure people they help - mostly with non-perishable food.
Why? Because as a practical matter, the first place donated food goes to is a collection box. Perishable, healthy food donations would spoil before they made it from the box to a pantry or soup kitchen.
Amp Your Good’s technology replaces the traditional food drive physical collection model with an online giving model called Crowd-Feeding. It enables people to donate perishable food – fruits and vegetables, whole meals and other healthy food items – instead of non-perishable food items. Drives can even raise specific food items such as organic food and locally grown produce.
It provides a means of getting healthier food to food insecure people who typically lack access to healthy food and correspondingly have high rates of diet related conditions and diseases - obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer. Feeding America cites that “buying cheap, unhealthy food” as the #1 coping mechanism for people struggling with hunger.
The campaign will run this fall as a Food Day 2015 project from September 15, 2015 to November 25, 2015 with Food Day (October 24) right in the middle. Dozens of organizations have already signed onto the campaign, including Curbing Hunger, the National Association of Health and Fitness and SuperFoodDrive, sponsoring drives that will support hunger organizations in NJ, NY, CA, FL and other states. Organizations can visit www.RealFoodDrive.org to find our more about the campaign.
“We advocate for everyone to eat more Real Food. Asking people to donate Real Food to help those facing hunger is a natural for us and Amp Your Good’s Crowd-Feeding platform makes that possible,” according to Lilia Smelkova, campaign manager of Food Day. “We couldn’t be more excited about this first of its kind campaign.”
“Our mission is simple,” said Patrick O’Neill, CEO of Amp Your Good. “We want to turn the billions of canned goods donated to traditional food drives each year into REAL food - apples, oranges, sweet potatoes, whole meals and other healthy food.”
About Amp Your Good
Amp Your Good’s technology replaces the traditional food drive physical collection model with an online giving model called Crowd-Feeding.. Similar to crowd-funding site like Kickstarter, organizations use Amp’s platform to host their online food drive campaign. When people participate, rather than donate money (as they would on a crowd-funding site), they purchase food at Amp’s site to donate to the drive they want to support. When the drive is over, Amp delivers all of the food directly to the organization the drive is supporting. There are no collection boxes and no worries about food spoiling. Due to this, organizations can raise perishable, healthier food instead of canned goods. Visit AmpYourGood.com
About Food Day
Food Day inspires Americans to change their diets and our food policies. Food Day, created by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, is powered by a diverse coalition of food movement leaders, organizations, and people from all walks of life. Food Day takes place annually on October 24 to address issues as varied as health and nutrition, hunger, agricultural policy, animal welfare, and farm worker justice. The ultimate goal of Food Day is to strengthen and unify the food movement in order to improve our nation's food policies.
Read Full Story - Food Day and Amp Your Good Announce the REAL Food Drive Campaign | More news from this source
Press release distribution by PRLog
Food Day and Amp Your Good Announce the REAL Food Drive Campaign
August 04, 2015 at 10:16 AM EDT
