Here at South County Community Services, we often talk about providing assistance with people’s basic needs: housing, food, transportation, and medication. All of those are important, but nothing feels more essential than food. People in all types of situations use our food pantry – people who are unhoused, parents who are going through a lapse in employment, seniors trying to make their fixed incomes stretch just a little further. It is a truly universal need and a huge way that we help people. In 2025, we gave out over 60,000 pounds worth of food in 1,224 visits to our pantry, 200 of which were deliveries to homebound seniors.
We get our food from a variety of places; Kalamazoo Loaves and Fishes is a huge source of food for our pantry here in South County. In exchange for following their rules regarding distribution and reporting our numbers to them, they give us about half of the food that we give out here and deliver it for free every Tuesday. We get the rest of the food through the Simple Give program at Meijer and from community donations. The great thing about donations is that we get all kinds of food – instead of cases of the same boxed dinners, for example, we get a smorgasbord of selection including many things that we never would have picked out ourselves.
Did I mention yet that we have our big annual food drive coming up? We have two large food drives here at SCCS that are on opposite ends of the calendar – Vicksburg National Honors Society runs a drive for us in November, and in May we have the Postal Food Drive! Last year we had an amazing turnout with over 4,500 pounds donated. That food lasted us well into the summer and was great for providing some variety to our normal stock of food.
Please see our ad in this month’s edition of the South County News for our food needs if you would like to donate. Remember that we cannot distribute food that is more than one year past its expiration date, so please look for nonexpired food if you are looking to clear some things from your own shelves. We do take perishable food as donations, but the Postal Food Drive is not a good way to get those to us… if you have something that needs to be refrigerated, please drop it off while we are open.
If you need food, give us a call at 649-2901 to schedule a visit to the pantry! The food pantry is open 10 a.m.-noon, Monday-Thursday. You will be able to walk through the pantry and pick out approximately eight days’ worth of food that works for you and your family. We try to keep perishables in stock to complement the nonperishable donations that we receive, so you can expect meat, eggs, and cheese/milk as available.
Food is such an important part of not only our survival but also culture and family traditions. We are happy to be able to allow people to shop for food that works for them and enjoy the connections that we build with our clients over discussions about meals that are important to them.
Drew Johnson lives in Kalamazoo and is the Director at South County Community Services. He has a small quarter acre homestead with chickens, bees, and hops (and more!), a wonderful wife, and three energetic children. He can be reached at 649-2901 or ajohnson@southcountycs.com.
For more information on South County Community Services, please check out our Facebook page at facebook.com/southcountycs or visit our website: southcountycs.com.
