Food Helpers opens satellite location at Southpointe
Karen Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
A Food Helpers box truck is parked outside the food bank’s new satellite location at The HQ at CNX in Southpointe. Food Helpers held an open house Thursday to celebrate the opening of its new location.
Karen Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Food Helpers hosted an open house Thursday to celebrate the opening of its Southpointe satellite location at The HQ at CNX.
Karen Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
The Food Helpers satellite location at The HQ at CNX in Southpointe will serve as home base for the food bank’s Little Moochi program, a nutritional program that also provides snack packs to elementary students in several school districts in Washington, Greene and Fayette counties.
Food Helpers of Washington County celebrated the opening of its new satellite location at The HQ at CNX in Southpointe at an open house Thursday.
Donors and supporting organizations, clients, volunteers, board members, and others toured the inside of the new 7,000-square-foot space.
The new location, coupled with Food Helpers’ Centerville location, better positions the food bank to serve food-insecure families in Washington County and surrounding communities in upcoming years.
“The opening of the satellite operation is just a windfall for us, so thank you to CNX, which has given us more than 7,000 square feet to use as a satellite volunteer spot,” said George Omiros, president and CEO of Food Helpers. He noted Food Helpers was outgrowing its space at the Centerville location.
The HQ at CNX was created to provide co-working spaces where nonprofit, charitable, underserved and underrepresented organizations would have an opportunity to ramp up their businesses.
Food Helpers, which rents the space for a nominal fee, joins about a dozen other nonprofits at The HQ, and there is space available for 25 others.
“Food Helpers really embodies our mission through what they do, and we’re so happy that they’re here. They’ve been wonderful to work with, and we’re really excited to grow our HQ community,” said Melissa Wilson, media relations and operations manager at The HQ at CNX.
Omiros said the satellite location will primarily be used as home base for the Food Helpers Little Moochi program, a nutritional program that encourages children to make good food choices and provides them with healthy snacks.
Little Moochi is an app that teaches healthy eating habits by having children feed a virtual “Moochi” pet.
When children eat a meal or snack, they feed their pet at the same time by taking a photo of what’s on their plate and uploading it to the app.
The AI-powered Little Moochi app recognizes millions of different types of food and compares it to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s nutrition guidelines.
When kids eat wholesome foods, their Moochi becomes stronger, healthier and happier. If they eat too many unhealthy foods and sugary snacks, Moochi doesn’t feel well and becomes unhappy.
Food Helpers provides the program and healthy snack packs each month to more than 7,000 children in 13 school districts in Washington, Greene and Fayette counties.
Athena Petrolias, operations manager at the Southpointe CNX location for Food Helpers said the nonprofit was running out of space at the Centerville warehouse to assemble the Little Moochie snack packs, and the large office space at Southpointe is an ideal packing station.
Food Helpers also will prepare for its community outreach holiday program at the Southpointe location, which will include assembling fixings boxes that will accompany a turkey distribution in November and a ham distribution in December.
Previously, food bank offices, operations and warehouse space were in the same building. Moving the offices and the Little Moochi program to HQ at CNX enabled Food Helpers to convert the office space to warehouse space that the food bank needs to meet increased demand for its other programs.
Since 2021, Food Helpers’ monthly community outreach food distribution program has ballooned from 400 boxes per month to more than 1,400 boxes a month, Omiros said.
The Food Bank’s PA Senior Box Program, which provides food boxes to low-income seniors in Washington and Greene counties, has grown from 350 senior households to 1,650 households.
Additionally, the new satellite location provides volunteer opportunities for people who live closer to the Canonsburg site than the Centerville warehouse.
“We welcome volunteers. Our home base in Centerville is a little far for some folks in this area; some folks are appreciative of the fact that this is closer to their residence,” said Petrolias. “We have some very committed volunteers who drive out to Centerville to help us at that packing location, but this location is a little closer to some folks. It’s a little more convenient for them than driving out to Centerville but we still do need volunteers at our Centerville location.”
For more than 42 years, the Greater Washington County Food Bank has been providing groceries, and nutritional information and education to food insecure residents of Washington County. Food Helpers distributes food through a network of 38 sites, including 13 public sites and 18 senior high-rise and apartment locations, and with agencies throughout the county.
It also operates Country Thrift Market, a store that offers gently used clothing, toys, games, household items, and other products, with profits used to purchase food for food-insecure residents, and The Farm, where Food Helpers grows fruits and vegetables for the food bank’s clients
Among the other tenants at HQ at CNX are Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Pittsburgh, Dress for Success Pittsburgh, The Language and Behavior Center, Leadership Washington County and Transitional Paths to Independent Living – TRPIL.