Food Drives and Related Events


  • Organize a Food Drive

  • It’s easy, it’s fun and helps build muscles! Please consider organizing a Food Drive at your work, school, church or with your community group. We’ll supply everything you’ll need. Sign up here. Call 510-635-3663, ext. 318 or email us for more information.

  • General Food Drive

  • Organize a food drive barrel at your workplace, school, or organization. Hunger is a year-round problem.

  • Lenten Food Drive (February 6 - March 23)

  • This Lenten season, the Alameda County Community Food Bank invites local churches to help us feed the hungry in our community. While many Christians make the choice to adopt Lent as a time of fasting and abstinence, some of our neighbors do not have a choice. Your church can help by participating in our annual Lenten Food Drive, in which you can host food drive barrels and ask parishioners to donate food and/or money. The drive starts on Ash Wednesday and ends on Easter.

    Participation in the Lenten Food Drive is easy. We will supply you with collection barrels and promotional materials to encourage donations.

  • School Food Drive (March 1 - March 31)

  • Help fight hunger! Sign up now for Alameda County Community Food Bank’s School Food Drive, which runs March 1 – March 31.

    One in three children in Alameda County face the threat of hunger every day. The goal of the food drive is to collect 35,000 pounds of food for hungry families while educating students about hunger in their own community and empowering them to address local problems. Participation is open to schools in Alameda County from kindergarten through college.

    March also marks National Nutrition Month. This food drive provides an opportunity to learn about healthy eating and nutritional guidelines. Food drive participants will receive collection bins and bags as well as curriculum materials about hunger education and nutrition. Educational presentations are available upon request. Student groups are encouraged to visit and volunteer at the Food Bank.

  • Letter Carriers’ Food Drive (May 10th)

  • Thousands of Bay Area letter carriers will pick up more than just the mail as they travel their routes on Saturday, May 10th during the "Stamp Out Hunger" food drive - they'll also collect food donations from the public. During the National Association of Letter Carriers’ (www.nalc.org) Food Drive, the nation's largest one-day effort, local postal workers collect non-perishable food donations that people set out at their mailboxes. This huge collection drive raises food to help Bay Area Food Banks ready themselves for summer, when emergency food requests increase dramatically.

    Last year's drive raised 71.3 million pounds nationwide. Bay Area residents are encouraged to put a bag of healthy, non-perishable food, such as canned vegetables and fruits, tuna fish, peanut butter, rice, dry beans and pasta, near their home or business mailbox on the morning of Saturday, May 10th. Letter carriers will pick up the food when the mail is delivered and bring it to a local food bank.

  • Summer Food Drive (June 16 - August 31)

  • For many children who rely on school lunch programs, summer vacation can mean the end to their only nutritious meal of the day. This summer, the Alameda County Community Food Bank is working hard to promote awareness about the summer lunch sites available throughout the county and providing people with the nutritious food that they need. Let’s work together to close the summer lunch gap and make a difference in the lives of children in our community!

  • High Holy Days Food Drive (Monday, September 29 - Thursday, October 9)
  • Holiday Food Drive (October 1 - January 31)
  • Scouting For Food (November 15)

  • The Boy Scouts of America "Scouting For Food" Food Drive demonstrates how youth can have a positive impact on a serious problem in their own community and involves more than 40,000 Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, Venturers and Explorers throughout the Bay Area. To kick off this food drive, the Boy Scouts will distribute collection bags throughout the Bay Area on Saturday, November 8. On Saturday, November 15, residents are asked to fill the bags with nutritious, non-perishable food, then place them outside their front doors before 9:00 a.m. Scouts from ten Bay Area councils will collect the food and deliver it to Bay Area food banks. Residents who don't receive a bag can still participate by dropping off food at a red food drive barrel in any Safeway store.



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