Utilizing an innovative on-line approach, the Leadership Morris program of the Morris County Chamber of Commerce recently held their 2^nd Annual Picnic as a summer get together for the program’s alumni and as a rallying point to conduct a food drive to support the Interfaith Food Pantry.   To give a boost to their drive, they set up an online food drive at the www.YouGiveGoods.com/PicnicWithaPurpose . 

Their drive was set up so that people could bring food to the picnic or donate online.  The results were impressive – the online drive raised over 1500 lbs. of food.  That compared to about 80 lbs. that were brought to the picnic itself.   Other contributions brought the drive’s total to over a ton of food.

According to Patrick O’Neill, CEO of YouGiveGoods, “That’s not surprising to us.  We usually see a big difference between the online drive results compared to what people donate the traditional way.  It’s really about convenience.  A couple of people contributed $100 worth of food to their drive – that’s the equivalent of purchasing 8 to 10 bags worth of groceries at the supermarket.  I don’t think anyone is going to go to a picnic carrying that much food.”

“We were very pleased with the results of the drive – our alumni really stepped up to the plate,” according to Leon Moreau, who spearheaded the event for Leadership Morris.   “We raised over twice as much food as last year and most of it came from the online drive.”  He continued, “YouGiveGoods is a solid operation, nice people to work with.  They delivered the goods donated online right to the Interfaith Food Pantry’s delivery dock and the Leadership Morris alumni helped to unload the truck.  After that, we had the opportunity to tour the Pantry’s new facility and learn about the surprising number of people here in Morris County who are dealing with hunger.”

According to Carolyn Lake, spokeswoman for the Interfaith Food Pantry, “Much of our food is collected by organizations that disband for the summer, and we see our donations drop significantly during this season.”  The donations from Leadership Morris will “help tremendously,” Lake said. 

Joe Nazzaro, executive director of Leadership Morris, said “we set our donation goal at $2,500 worth of goods and we were pleased to see that the online drive alone allowed us to generate over $2500 worth of donated food.”  He continued “This innovative technology allowed us to expand our base tremendously and bring more donors into the fold.”  After counting the food brought to the picnic directly and several monetary donations, the group hit their goal and more.

Leadership Morris is a highly regarded community education program of the Morris County Chamber of Commerce.  The Program teaches business professionals and not-for-profit executives about the opportunities, challenges, institutions and the people of Morris County.

YouGiveGoods is based in Mendham, NJ and is operated by a group of people who strongly believe in the importance of helping others in need.  The company’s website, YouGiveGoods.com, was developed to make it easier for people and organizations to set up and run in-kind charity drives, including food drives and animal shelter drives.  The site provides free services to charities and makes it simpler for people to donate goods to the charities they want to support.  The innovative technology platform is designed to inspire people to give and help others.  Visit YouGiveGoods.com