NAZARETH, Pa.— A thousand more families will have a turkey on their tables this Thanksgiving, thanks to a Pennsylvania-based grocery store chain.
It's because of an annual partnership in which Giant Food Stores donates 1,000 turkeys and other components of a Thanksgiving dinner to the Second Harvest Food Bank.
"It will be everything that everybody will need to put a meal on their tables."Tammy Serfass, who works in Human Resources for Giant Food Stores
The grocery chain also does the initiative across Pennsylvania, along with Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. It handed out 15,000 turkeys in total this year.
It goes far beyond turkeys, according to Tammy Serfass, who works in Human Resources for Giant and came to help out Tuesday.
"So we're putting together a whole Thanksgiving meal," Serfass said. "We as a company, provided all the turkeys, as well as some of the canned goods that are here.
"But what we're doing as volunteers today is putting together a box of 25 pounds of food that's separate from the turkeys.
"So it will be everything that everybody will need to put a meal on their tables."
'The demand just keeps growing'
On Tuesday, 12 volunteers in the Second Harvest warehouse sorted turkeys, potatoes, gravy and canned peas, putting them in boxes to get ready for distribution.
The person running the show was Amour Inman, volunteer coordinator for the Second Harvest Food Bank through Community Action Lehigh Valley.
Inman said from the food bank's warehouse, they serve 80,000 people a month.
"It's large," Inman said. "Because the demand just keeps growing."
In the warehouse, there was a large Bluetooth speaker playing the song "Respect" by Aretha Franklin.
"I am picking the playlist right now, but it's a pretty tame playlist," Inman said. "I like to pick a lot of techno, usually."
Inman said it's not really the music that gets her and the team pumped up, but the mission.
"It makes me feel really good," she said. "I wake up very proud to come to my job every day because I know what we're doing, I know the work we're doing, and it's the mission that keeps me alive."
Second Harvest serves Lehigh, Northampton, Carbon, Monroe, Pike and Wayne counties.
Inman said she still is looking for volunteers, and that can be arranged through Community Action Lehigh Valley's website.
