Goodwill Northern Michigan

Thanks to your support, our Northern Michigan neighbors are finding stability, dignity, and a place to call home. Your donations help people move out of homelessness and into housing — where healing and new beginnings start.

Our Food Rescue of Northwest Michigan program only works because of the incredible partners who turn rescued food into dignity, nourishment, and care for our neighbors. Today, we’re deeply grateful to spotlight 5loaves2fish, a community meal program at the Leland Community United Methodist Church.

In their own words:

“We provide meals for people experiencing food insecurity and homelessness — we feed people, no questions asked. We started small, but then COVID hit. We set up meal sites where people could pick up meals, and that changed everything — we went from 45 meals a week to about 500 meals a week. Today, five years later, we have nine meal sites.

Food Rescue is essential — we could not run this program without them. We could not afford to buy 2,000 pounds of food each week. Food Rescue has created a community in its own right, picking up, delivering, connecting, allowing us to make meals with good food that someone else was going to throw away. They’re like the hub, and we’re all spokes, working together to reduce waste and build dignity through food.

Food Rescue drives the menu because we never know what’s coming in on the Monday delivery truck. Very little is stockpiled — it comes in, we cook it, it goes out. It’s fun to be creative, and cooking for people who are hungry is deeply meaningful. Every meal is made with intention and love.”

— Michelle and Bill White, Jenna Fulton, and Josh Miller

We are so thankful to 5Loaves2Fish for their creativity, hard work, and shared commitment to feeding people with dignity.

We wrapped up 2025 with our Food Rescue of Northwest Michigan program's new mobile app fully up and running — and our volunteers made it a record-setting month.

Even with holiday closures and tough weather, 100% of December app rescues were completed by volunteers, moving over 14,000 lbs of food to pantries and meal sites and diverting 1,600+ lbs of scraps from landfills.

Huge thanks to everyone helping rescue food, reduce waste, and support our community — we couldn’t do this without you. If you’re interested in joining the fun, visit www.foodrescue.us to get started!