Postal Service employees will step up to Stamp Out Hunger — an annual food drive to help feed those in need — on Saturday, May 13.
The National Association of Letter Carriers leads the one-day event, with help from USPS, the National Rural Letter Carriers’ Association, the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, the AFL-CIO, the Kellogg Co., CVS Health, Valpak, United Way Worldwide, Vericast and local food pantries.
To participate, USPS customers are asked to fill a bag with healthy, nonperishable food items and place it by their mailbox for mail carriers to pick up. During the drive, postal employees collect the food and donate it to local food banks and pantries.
Stamp Out Hunger is the nation’s largest one-day food drive, with 1.82 billion pounds of food collected since it began in 1993 — including 41.2 million pounds last year.
The drive is held in spring because many schools suspend their breakfast and lunch programs for the summer, leaving millions of kids in need of alternative sources of nutrition.
“That makes the timing of the food drive crucial,” said NALC President Brian L. Renfroe. “Letter carriers go out on their routes and see up close what their communities need.”
More than 34 million Americans, including 9 million children, experience food insecurity and rely on food donations, according to a video on the NALC website.
The COVID-19 pandemic caused the cancellation of in-person food collection in 2020 and 2021. In its place, NALC held virtual drives for online donations. Last year, when in-person collection resumed, the option to contribute online was retained.
The Stamp Out Hunger site has additional information for this year’s drive, including a toolkit for participants, promotional materials, community engagement guidelines and ways to contribute online.