You may have thought about hosting a food drive, but just aren’t sure how to get started. Maybe you’ve never organized a food drive before. Maybe you want to put a different or creative spin on it. With that in mind, we put together these tips for organizing a fun food drive.
1. If you’re having a birthday, an anniversary, or another celebration, ask your friends to bring canned or nonperishable food items instead of gifts. Afterward, you can make a donation in honor of the event.
2. Use a theme. If your food drive is going to last longer than one day, giving each day a different theme can be a fun way to make sure you collect a variety of foods. If your food drive is only going to be a single day, a theme can focus your efforts. Here are some examples:
• Meat the Need – Ask for canned meats, tuna fish, and other high-protein items
• Garden Variety – Ask for canned fruits and vegetables
• Oodles of Noodles – Ask for macaroni and cheese, spaghetti, and other pastas
• Macaroni Monday, Tuna Tuesday, etc
3. Organize a potluck lunch or dinner, and ask participants to also bring the (nonperishable) ingredients for the dishes they prepared. This keeps the focus on food, and you’ll have a great time sampling all the dishes.
4. Host a game and/or movie night, and ask guests to bring canned food donations. Not only is this sure to be a fun evening, but you’ll have the added satisfaction of doing a good thing.
5. Make it a scavenger hunt. Create a list of food items for youth group teams to ask for as they go door-to-door (with appropriate supervision). Assign a point value to each item so scores can be totaled at the end.
6. Turn it into a competition between teams, departments, or individuals. At the end, you can give certificates or awards for different categories like largest individual donation or most vegetables.
