After seeing clients brace sweltering heat, limited access to bathrooms, and other physical challenges while waiting on pantry lines, The Campaign Against Hunger knew it had to step in.
Just before the pandemic hit, the Brooklyn-based hunger relief agency began investigating ways to deliver groceries directly to the doorsteps of people with physical and other challenges. It created a home-delivery program that has since been through a number of iterations and has its own challenges in terms of cost and resources. But Founder and Executive Director Dr. Melony Samuels sees home delivery as a home run.
“I think it’s the wave of the future,” she said. Home delivery is “a futuristic way of working with our community. We’re looking at tackling food injustice in this manner.”
Each week, TCAH carries out 250 to 300 deliveries to eligible clients within a 10- to 20-mile radius of its warehouse. It staffs four vehicles with its own drivers and is about to acquire a fifth vehicle. Many of the details are executed with the help of technology, including route planning software from OptimoRoute, text messaging to notify clients of upcoming deliveries, and digital photos showing the delivered food. “We like to call it the non-profit Amazon,” said Racquel Peters, Chief Development Officer.
In addition to the vehicles and drivers, costs include vehicle insurance, operational expenses, shelving for the vehicles, and equipping the drivers with special backpacks so they can transport deliveries up stairs. “From an infrastructure and staffing perspective, it is a big cost for us,” Peters acknowledged.
Even so, the costs are lower than they used to be when a collaboration with DoorDash and its Project DASH initiative ended, and the organization was paying about $9 per delivery using DoorDash. “That’s ludicrous for a not-for-profit, right?” Dr. Samuels said. “If you’re delivering 50 bags for the day, you’re breaking our bank.” Today, the organization is better able to sustain the program, as well as add to job creation in the community by running it with its own drivers through the help of private donors, foundations and funding from federal, state and local governments.
Clients of the home delivery service select the exact foods they would like through TCAH’s CyberPantry, a platform powered by software from SmartChoice that supports online ordering. Once orders are placed, team members pack the groceries into orange bags. Deliveries are typically fulfilled within 24 hours, but if clients want their food sooner, they can opt for on-site pick up.
TCAH also offers an on-site supermarket-style pantry that operates Monday through Friday, from nine to five, serving about 250 households a day. Before shopping, whether in-person or online, clients must meet with the Benefits Access Office that’s two doors down from the pantry to register into the system. Clients are asked the standard pantry questions: how many are living in their household, are they enrolled in food assistance programs, and other demographic information. The process helps to identify those who are eligible for home delivery because of family commitments, work, their age or other physical constraints. From there, clients have a certain number of points to shop for grocery categories like grains, protein and fresh produce.
TCAH sees home delivery as an essential component of food distribution, bringing security and dignity to the most vulnerable populations. “It’s not just the regular food pantry that is important in this moment,” Peters said. “But how do we reach those who have been cut off from food?” Thinking about the elderly, the disabled, veterans and those who have been left behind, Dr. Samuels said she felt the need to “invest in something new, something definitely different.”
The anonymity of the service, combined with a client’s ability to choose their own food ensures dignity, further adding to home delivery’s solid place in the future of food distribution. “This could be massive work,” Dr. Samuels said. “We can rewrite hunger in New York City through this.” – Gabriela Flores
Gabriela Flores is a graduate student at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. She is interning at Food Bank News for the summer and has previously reported for Mott Haven Herald, The Rockaway Wave, City Limits and Queens Daily Eagle.
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