Local Student Premieres a Blockbuster Idea
by Iris Valanti, Director of Communications

One day in February, a young woman named Jessica Kearney called the Food Bank. She had an idea for a food drive; could she come out and discuss it with us? Of course!

“Remember when the first Twilight movie opened and the blood banks held blood drives at the premiere?” she asked the day she came out to the Food Bank. “Well, the first book of The Hunger Games trilogy has been made into a movie that’s opening in March. I thought it sounded like a good opportunity to get movie fans involved with hunger.”

(About 3 weeks later, Feeding America partnered with the movie’s national release and asked member food banks to hold events – ha! Jessica thought of it first!)

Over the next few months, Jessica organized a food drive which offered a great prize for donating a bag of groceries: a pair of free tickets to The Hunger Games Pittsburgh premiere for the first 50 donors, and for the next 50, a pair of free movie passes to be used at some later date.

Like everything that sounds simple enough, Jessica actually worked very hard to arrange all the details: approaching several theaters with the idea; purchasing the premiere tickets (her donation to the event); arranging the food drive date and logistics, promoting the event herself with local media, and last, but by no means least, running the food drive with the help of a few friends she talked into giving up their Sunday!

The Food Bank is proud and humbled to partner with many many wonderful community projects, but we shine a little extra light on Jessica here to show how one person, on her own initiative, took an idea and a little elbow grease and raised $350 and more than 400 pounds of food in a few afternoon hours. As a Masters in Journalism student at Point Park University, this project was actually an assignment for one of her classes. We certainly think Jessica deserves an A+!!