At Varsity, one of the ways that we try to “give back” is through all-company volunteer events. Recently, members of the Varsity team rolled up their sleeves, pulled on tight plastic gloves, and got to work at the San Francisco Food Bank.
It’s quite an impressive operation they have. We learned that they move around 45 million pounds of food per day! About 60% is fresh produce, which is a significant increase from just a few years ago when it was only about 5%. This is a wonderful accomplishment because they are bringing nutritious and fresh food to so many families.
Here is what our day at the Food Bank looked like:
- 9:00am – 10:30am: We transferred 14,000 pounds of cantaloupe from giant boxes into smaller boxes for distribution to non-profits.
- 10:30am – 11:15am: We moved into the rice room where we worked efficiently in teams to turn (stay with me here) one 100 pound bag of rice into 100 one pound bags of rice. We took turns scooping the rice into bags (eyeballing the correct amount) and had a blast cheering for each other whenever we managed to successfully measure out exactly one pound of rice. Wooo!
- 11:15am – 11:30am: Break time! Complete with complimentary beverages (nice touch). This gave us a chance to stretch and sit down for a little rest.
- 11:30am 12:00pm: Back to the rice room to finish what we started.
It was great to have the opportunity to volunteer with coworkers (can’t think of a better excuse to get out of the office!).
And who can deny that satisfying feeling you walk away with, knowing you’ve donated your time for something good—in the time our volunteer group spent that day, we packaged the equivalent of 12,000 meals.
If you are looking for a way to give back, I highly recommend giving the San Francisco Food Bank a try. You can check out their volunteer schedule and sign up here.
