Louisiana Target Donates Frozen Food to the Hungry After Black-Out

Thousands of children won’t go hungry because of quick-thinking Target employees in Metairie, Lousiana. The store lost power a few weeks ago when a transformer blew and employees found themselves in the dark. However, they managed to salvage 8,000 pounds of frozen food instead of dumping it in the trash, donating it to Second Harvest Food Bank in Southern Louisiana. With no power the employees created an assembly line lugging 50- to 70-pound boxes along the downed escalator.

A cell phone video taken by Second Harvest which captured how the scene unfolded, has gone viral making it’s way onto the Facebook page of WFAA Channel 8 in Dallas, Texas. The posting has been met with mostly positive responses such as, “This Target store is awesome. They lost a lot during Katrina so they understand paying it back.”

Here is the video:

Jay Vise, the communications marketing manager at Second Harvest told local Louisiana TV station WWLTV, “I’d call it controlled chaos, but it was very organized. It was really something to see, and the boxes employees had to carry down the escalator weren’t light. We’re very grateful the management and staff there thought to call us.”

According to the Second Harvest Food Bank website, one-in-six households in Louisiana are at risk for hunger. They provide nearly 23 million meals to 210,000 individuals annually.

This donation is especially bittersweet as Hurricane Katrina felled their service area, forcing them out of their facility in New Orleans, regrouping in Baton Rouge within 48 hours of its landfall. By the following month, Second Harvest became the largest food bank in the world’s history, with help from Feeding America and skilled food bank volunteers from all over the country.

The food, which is being kept in a large walk-in freezer at Second Harvest, will be dispersed around South Louisiana serving 23 parishes and hundreds of local food pantries.