Fight Hunger. Spark Change.

We are very fortunate. My family and my children have never know hunger. This is not the case for a large majority of our nation. In fact, there are many children at our local elementary school that are hungry. They rely on assistance from the government and community to get by.

The USDA reports that one in seven Americans are currently struggling with hunger. That totals at 48 million people in America with more than 15 million of them being children.

Walmart’s “Fight Hunger. Spark Change.” campaign calls on their customers and suppliers to join them in the fight against hunger. Through the “Fight Hunger. Spark Change.” campaign, Walmart is working with five suppliers —Campbell Soup Company, General Mills, Kellogg Company, the Kraft Heinz Company, and PepsiCo — to give millions of customers an opportunity to fight hunger in their local communities.

By combining Walmart’s donation with supplier donations through product purchases and customer donations at the register, the campaign has a goal of helping Feeding America secure 75 million meals on behalf of its member food banks. As the nation’s leading hunger-relief organization, the Feeding America network provides food to more than 46 million people in communities across America.

How can the Community Get Involved?

“Fight Hunger. Spark Change.” will run in all U.S. Walmart stores from March 28 to April 25, and offers three easy ways to participate.

Shop In the Store:

Purchase participating products in Walmart stores to help provide meals for families who struggle with hunger in your local community. For every participating product purchased at Walmart between March 28th and April 25th, 2016, the manufacturer will donate $0.09 to Feeding America – enough to secure one meal on behalf of local food banks – up to each manufacturer’s maximum donation, which is provided on the participating packages. See package or Walmart.com/FightHunger for details.

It was incredibly easy to find the participating products to purchase in the store. The signs were big and bold and very easy to spot as soon as we walked into the store. Even better, they had some on the end-caps at the registers too, to make it easy to pick them up and get the manufacturer to make a donation.

Donate In The Store:

Each cashier actually had a scan code on their register ready to help us make a donation. Instead of making food purchases, we wanted all of the money to go to fighting hunger, so we made a donation at the register. It was easy and we were done at the register in a matter of seconds.

Online:

Generate donations for Feeding America food banks through online acts of support!

• Use #FightHunger on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram
• Share and like campaign posts on Facebook
• Show your support on Walmart.com/fighthunger
• Use unique Snapchat filters in select stores
• For each online act of support, Walmart will donate enough to help Feeding America secure 10 meals (an equivalent of $0.90) on behalf of its member food banks, up to $1.5 million. To kick off the campaign, Walmart will make an initial donation of $1.5 million to Feeding America. Based on the public’s social engagement, we aim to reach a total donation of $3 million.

The next time you are in Walmart, make sure you are making purchases that will generate a donation, or make one yourself. You can also participate online at no cost to you! I think we can all handle a couple uses of #FightHunger on social media!

How are you helping to fight hunger?