🛍️ A Big Bag of Thanks to Our Community!
We're extremely grateful to New York Packaging / RediBag USAÂ for their generous donation of 3,600 reusable, insulated bags (300 boxes!) to Springs Food Pantry! A special thank-you to Jonathan Leopold, who worked with his client, New York Packaging, to arrange this wonderful contribution of surplus bags.
"Thank you to New York Packaging / RediBag USA for this incredibly generous donation, and to Jonathan Leopold for making the connection with his client and helping bring it all together! These insulated bags will make a real difference in our weekly operations. Not only will they save us money by eliminating the need to purchase bags, but their reusability will also help reduce waste while keeping meat, dairy and other perishable foods fresh for our recipients. We're so grateful for this thoughtful contribution to our community."— Kira Brandman, Operations Director, Springs Food Pantry
Getting 300 boxes of bags from the warehouse in New Hyde Park, nearly 100 miles from Springs, and finding space to store them, was no small undertaking. Fortunately, our dedicated volunteers stepped up to make it happen!
đźš— Volunteers Going the Extra Mile
Early on a recent Saturday morning, Mary Pagnotta, her husband Dan Terrasi, her father Bob Pagnotta and her friend Teddy Caspar drove several cars to the warehouse in New Hyde Park to pick up over 130 boxes of bags. We're tremendously grateful to Mary's family and friends for generously giving their time and vehicles to help Springs Food Pantry!
A team from Ronald Webb Builders, including Gustavo "Chino" Coria, Bryan Coria, Amarilis Cotuc and Santiago Jimenez, also made the round trip to the warehouse, generously providing their truck, fuel, time and helping hands to pick up another 120 boxes. Many of our recipients will recognize Chino as the friendly face directing traffic during our Wednesday distributions. Huge thanks to the entire team and Ronald Webb Builders for going the extra mile to support Springs Food Pantry!
And when additional help was needed, Max Kupferman and Will Salinetti, friends of our Volunteer Coordinator Karen Reuben, stepped in to pick up the remaining boxes using their families' vehicles. Major thanks to these young men and their parents for answering the call!
A special thank-you also goes to Jose and Bharrat from RediBag USA, who were at the warehouse to help our volunteer teams load and organize the boxes for their trips back to Springs. Their assistance helped make this tremendous undertaking possible!
📦 Finding Room for 3,600 Bags
Once the bags arrived in Springs, our volunteers faced another challenge: finding enough space to store them.
For those who may not know, Springs Food Pantry rents space at Springs Community Presbyterian Church. The auditorium where we operate is shared with other organizations, community events and church activities. While we're grateful to have this space for our weekly operations, there's simply not enough room to store such a large quantity of bags.
That's where our volunteers stepped in once again, offering their homes and garages for temporary storage.
Mary Pagnotta and her family generously offered to store over 100 boxes at their home, in addition to their tremendous help transporting bags from the warehouse. We are so appreciative of Mary and her family for their just-in-time support!
Lisa King, one of our longtime volunteers, offered to store 20 boxes at her home.
And Kira Brandman generously made room in the garage of her newly renovated home to store 120 boxes delivered directly from the warehouse by the Ronald Webb Builders team. A special thank-you to Kira and her husband, Andrew, for sharing their space!
We're also grateful to Jonathan Leopold, Josh Masten, Mark Mandrakos and Marcia Reilly, who stepped in when additional help was needed.
Next Step: We're now working to secure a more permanent storage facility where we can consolidate all the boxes in one location. This will make it easier to manage our supply of bags while relieving our generous volunteers of the need to store them in their homes.
❤️ Neighbors Helping Neighbors
As a 100% volunteer-led organization, Springs Food Pantry depends on people willing to go the extra mile for their community. This effort is a wonderful example of that spirit, with volunteers, family members and friends coming together to make a generous donation possible.
Our heartfelt thanks to New York Packaging / RediBag USAÂ and everyone who helped bring these bags to Springs. Your generosity will benefit the nearly 350 families we serve each week, helping keep their groceries fresh while reducing waste and costs through reuse.
Neighbors helping neighbors. That's what Springs Food Pantry is all about. ❤️
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