This year, two of the best football teams in the country faced off in an epic game to bring home coveted championship rings. At Food Recovery Network (FRN), we were vying to bring home something else: thousands of pounds of delicious, salvageable food from the annual Bullseye Event Group Players Tailgate, catered by celebrity chefs Bobby Flay and Aaron May.
On Sunday, February 11, 2024, six volunteers, including FRN alumni and local students from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, joined FRN staff at the Players Tailgate just across the street from Allegiant Stadium to recover surplus food—both raw, fresh foods and prepared meals—and transport it for donation to The Just One Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to fighting food insecurity in southern Nevada.
Our efforts resulted in an incredible 3,994 pounds of surplus food delivered safely to our nonprofit partner, where it’ll go to produce thousands of quality meals to feed people experiencing hunger.
The food we recovered included prepared foods, uncooked proteins, dairy, fresh produce, condiments, spices, grains, and more—ingredients that food banks and pantries don’t often receive in donations. The real kicker? This year’s tailgate recovery brought in half a ton more food than the 2023 recovery in Glendale, Arizona. We can’t thank our volunteers enough for the time and energy they contributed to make this event a success.
But the event was special in more ways than one. This year’s recovery was also our first in partnership with Hellmann’s, who contributed $100,000 to our cause of ending food waste and food insecurity across the U.S. Our Big Game celebrations continued on Monday, February 12, with the first annual celebration of “Sick Of Food Waste Day,” a new holiday declared by Hellmann’s.
““We all have the power to ensure perfectly good food doesn’t go to waste.” ”
As we expand our network of partners, we’re excited to watch our impact grow, both on college campuses and at huge events like these. The amazing thing about this work is that we can all contribute on whatever level we’re able to. Whether you’re organizing a food recovery event in your community or just reusing leftovers for another meal, we can all be a part of the fight against food waste. No matter which team you root for, we can all agree: No person in our country should go hungry.
We hope you’ll join us to help fight waste and feed people year-round.