BUILDING FOR
OUR FUTURE

Food Bank of the Rockies invites you to partner with us as we pursue our ambitious goal:
providing our communities with enough nutritious and familiar food to thrive.

A new Denver Metro distribution center is integral to achieving this goal.

BETTER FOOD

We’ve helped reshape people’s understanding of a food bank—from a place that makes good use of leftovers to an organization that nourishes a community. But we can do so much more for our partners and the people they serve.
Years ago, people equated the term “food bank” with a warehouse full of leftover soda, canned soup, and crackers—sugar and sodium that could sit on a shelf forever. We’ve helped change that. Our goal isn’t simply to distribute as much food as possible—it’s to nourish people with fresh produce, to offer meals that reflect a community’s cultural heritage, and to meet the needs of growing children and aging adults.
graphic indicating that fruits, vegetables, protein, and dairy represent more than 2/3 of all food that Food Bank of The Rockies distributes.
That work will be much easier to accomplish in a new facility. Our current kitchen is tiny, just large enough to hold three employees and six volunteers who can do little more than reheat food, prepare sandwiches, and slice vegetables.

Our new 8,500-square-foot kitchen will allow seven staff and 20 volunteers to collaborate, preparing meals and, when possible, cooking from scratch while offering culinary training that
can make the difference between a job and a career. More room, more help, and more modern equipment translates to better meals.

We’re already looking to raise the bar in the following ways:

  • Offering a new “order ahead” meal program that allows people to select food item by item, once we’ve acquired more storage and initiated more frequent food deliveries.

  • Expanding our healthcare partnership program, which offers nutritious food for community members with medical conditions including diabetes and hypertension.

  • Introducing innovative approaches that are already redefining best practices in food banks across the country.

The new kitchen won’t just be a little bigger – it’s moving us into a completely different category that allows us to prepare meals and cook from scratch when possible. We won’t simply reheat food and slice vegetables; we’ll be able to craft more nutritious menus and more culturally responsive meals—everything from Vietnamese to Russian to Mexican, which helps us make a bigger impact in diverse communities.

– CINDY MITCHELL
VICE PRESIDENT OF PROGRAMS
FOOD BANK OF THE ROCKIES