Commercial Food Donations
MANNA recovers excess food and various products from local and national manufacturers, wholesalers, growers, packers, distributors, supermarkets, and trucking companies. Local food industry partners such as Ingles Markets, Wal-Mart, Lipman Produce, Food Lion, Flavor 1st Growers and Packers, Milkco, and many others regularly support us in our effort to end hunger in Western North Carolina. MANNA also works directly with retail locations of regional and national food industry partners, like Trader Joe’s, Harris Teeter, Whole Foods, and with food manufacturers and distributors such ConAgra, Kraft Heinz, Nestle, Sysco, and others.
Contact Us to Make a Donation
Please contact our Food Sourcing Department to make a donation. You can call our main line at 828-299-3663, or email our Director of Food Sourcing.
The benefits of product donation are many, including:
- Your donation is tax deductible, as allowed by law
- Reduce storage and disposal fees
- Enhance inventory control by reducing hard-to-move products and unsaleables
- Put products to good use instead of to waste
- Boost employee morale
- Foster community goodwill
- Protect brand integrity
Download our printable Food Industry Fact Sheet.
ACCEPTED PRODUCTS
We accept all types of shelf stable foods, as well as fresh, refrigerated, and frozen food. We also accept non-food items such as paper products, cleaning supplies, and health and beauty aids. We gladly accept product that is safe for consumption, including the following:
- Close expiration dates
- Mislabeled products
- Surplus production
- Discontinued products
- Shipping errors
- Un-harvested or post-peak produce
- Cosmetically damaged items (with packaging intact)
- Imperfect packaging
- Production flaws
- Rejected deliveries
WHO BENEFITS FROM FOOD DONATIONS?
MANNA FoodBank distributes the products to more than 200 charitable organizations that feed people in need throughout Western North Carolina. These include food pantries, homeless shelters, soup kitchens, day care centers, and senior citizen feeding programs. Together, MANNA and our network of partners are serving more than 100,000 people across WNC facing an empty plate.
DONOR PROTECTION
The Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act, passed by Congress in 1996, protects citizens and businesses who donate apparently wholesome food or an apparently fit grocery product in good faith to a nonprofit organization for distribution to people in need. Read the Act.