Kentucky Harvest

About Us

Our Mission

Our mission is to end local hunger by connecting with food donors and engaging volunteers to rescue excess food and move it from those who have it to those in need.

Our Vision

The vision for Kentucky Harvest is to continue to develop local partnerships by connecting food companies with charities while leveraging our network of volunteers to focus on reducing food waste and getting usable food to the hungry in our local community.

Our Story

Kentucky Harvest was founded in 1987 because food was going to waste that could be rescued and served to people that desperately need it. Kentucky Harvest rescues both perishable and non-perishable food and delivers it to those in need.

Kentucky Harvest has one program and its called People Helping People. We rescue leftover and surplus food from restaurants, grocery stores, bakeries, companies, schools and food drives and then deliver it to homeless shelters, addiction recovery centers, children’s centers, churches, food pantries and other organizations where it is needed. This is food that would otherwise go to waste. We fill a gap in the community because unlike a food pantry, we get perishable food to people who are hungry in our area – that same day!

2022 Highlights

In 2022, we rescued over 2.7 million pounds of food and delivered it to 85 recipient organizations saving them over $4.4 million in estimated food costs so they can focus on programs that help make our community stronger. This food resulted in nearly 2.3 million meals for people in our communities who needed them. That’s over 6,000 meals per day!

Core Values

  • Community

    Community is the heart of our mission and we bring an intention to serve everyone in our community: the hungry, the organizations that feed them, our food donors, our supporting partners and financial donors.

  • Compassion

    With understanding and empathy, we anticipate the needs of our community partners and act to appropriately and meaningfully meet their needs. We are committed to treating everyone with compassion, dignity, respect, and patience.

  • Connected

    Our relationships to each other and our community partners are of the highest importance to us and we hold ourselves accountable to meeting our commitments to our partners and to each other.

  • Integrity

    We hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards. We work with our community partners in the spirit of mutual respect and collaboration.

  • Focus

    We have a simple mission and fill a gap in our local community by rescuing food that would otherwise go to waste and helping those who are hungry to be feed.

Our Program

Kentucky Harvest has only one program. It’s called People Helping People and it has been going on in our community since 1987. Kentucky Harvest picks up and delivers food to 80+ nonprofit partners across the Kentuckiana area. We rescue food that would have been discarded and we deliver it to homeless shelters, children’s centers, churches, addiction recovery centers, and other non-profits. We delivered over 2.7 million meals last year, that’s 7,500 meals per day! Hunger – or food insecurity, as it is now being called is real. One in 7 people struggle with food insecurity each day – that’s one in 6 children – having to make choices between eating and paying bills, or buying medicine that they need to survive. Take, for example, the woman that is in an addiction recovery program at the Healing Place with her 2 children, or the man at Greater St. Mark who has lost his wife and his job, but still has 3 kids to feed and needs a little help to get by until things turn around – those are the people that Kentucky Harvest helps through the organizations that support them. They get fed and they feed their children while still being able to focus on getting sober or finding a new home, a stable living environment and a job.

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