Every day, good food goes to waste while neighbors a few streets over wonder where the next meal is coming from. Feeding Charlotte, a food rescue nonprofit, works to close that gap one delivery at a time.
The model is simple: pick up nutritious surplus food from grocery stores, restaurants and other professional kitchens before it reaches a dumpster, then deliver it directly to partner agencies that serve people in need.
The numbers from last year tell the story. Feeding Charlotte completed nearly 3,000 food rescue runs, diverted more than 1.3 million pounds of food and turned it into over 1.1 million meals for neighbors across Mecklenburg, Gaston and Iredell counties, at a cost of roughly 25 cents per meal.
Drivers and partner agencies
At the heart of every run is a volunteer or program driver who picks up surplus food and delivers it, often the same day, to agencies across the three counties. From there the meals move through a network of more than 67 partner agencies, including transition programs, shelters, churches and community centers. By using systems that already exist, the organization moves food quickly without building duplicate ones.
"Food insecurity isn't happening somewhere else. It's happening right here in our own neighborhoods, often just blocks from the restaurants and grocery stores we go to every day," says Lesha Dodson, Feeding Charlotte's development manager. "What excites me about this work is how solvable it is. Perfectly good food already exists and we just have to move it before it goes to waste."
That outlook, she says, comes from a belief she carries into everything: "Community is a verb. It's knowing who has what, who needs it, and closing the gap."
Round up, pack a lunch, play kickball
This year the organization is widening the ways Charlotte can take part.
Round Up for Rescue invites restaurants and businesses to let customers round their bill up to the nearest dollar at checkout, with the difference going to food rescue operations. Feeding Charlotte is recruiting restaurant and business partners across the city to join.
Lunches of Love, a year-round program of hands-on meal-packing events for community and corporate groups, is expanding. The organization is looking for volunteers, meal sponsors and partners.
The Feeding Charlotte Kickball Throwdown, a community kickball tournament fundraiser, is set for Saturday, Nov. 21, 2026, at 9 a.m. at Park Road Park, with room for up to twelve teams. Sponsorships run from $500 to $5,000, according to the event listing.
The Food Sustainability Summit, an all-ages event with a panel discussion and hands-on volunteer projects benefiting local hunger relief organizations including Feeding Charlotte, was set for Saturday, Sept. 26, 2026, from 1 to 4 p.m. at Elevation Church's University campus. Details were at foodsustainabilitysummit.org.
To volunteer, donate or learn more, visit feedingcharlotte.org or contact Lesha Dodson at lesha@feedingcharlotte.org or 704-458-9178.
This story appears in the August 2026 issue of Stroll Quail Hollow.