Paul Davis: Supporting Local Food Pantries through a Creative CAN Challenge Food Drive

Donation drives are a popular and effective way to collect much-needed food for area food banks, but if you really want to engage your team members and make your food drive something everyone will be talking about, give them an added challenge to see what can be built with the donated items. That’s exactly what the creative Social Purpose Champions at Paul Davis did, and the results were incredible!

Building for Prizes & Bragging Rights

As you’ll see from the pictures in this post, team members took the challenge seriously and unleashed their creativity building fabulous structures out of donated canned goods. Photos of the structures were shared with the Paul Davis network and prizes were awarded for the locations with the Most Votes and the Most Cans.

All food collected was donated to local and human food pantries, many of which are in great need during summer months. Lots of companies organize food drives during the holiday season, which is  helpful, but by the time summer rolls around, many food banks are faced with empty shelves.

Hunger Bites won the award for Most Votes

More than 1,180 cans were used to build the Animal House structure

A Fun Challenge with a Big Impact

In addition to highly coveted bragging rights, the LLCO Animal House structure won in the Most Cans category with 1,188 cans, and Hunger Bites won Most Votes. Some offices took the challenge even further by incorporating other fun team building events including company BBQs and bowling outings. Collectively the challenge netted more than 3,100 cans of food!

“Words cannot express my gratitude, respect, and appreciation to everyone involved in this event,” said Quality Assurance Analyst Waleska Gonzalez. “Helping others when they need it the most is a cause I keep close to my heart and I am always looking for an opportunity to create awareness. I was happy to see the passion and commitment from my PD family.”

The PDR Jacksonville team created a unique cat structure using their cans

The team behind the Strike Out Hunger display continued their theme with an employee bowling party

Paul Davis Talent and Change Leader and JASMYN Volunteer Kali Freeland added, “At PDRI in Jacksonville, we donated the cans from our structure to a local LGBT Youth Crisis Center, JASMYN. JASMYN normally receives donations during the winter months, so they were especially grateful for Summer donations. I’m personally very proud to support this organization and I’m grateful that Paul Davis is embracing Social Purpose as well as Inclusion and Diversity!”  

Add Some Creativity to Your Next Food Drive

So if you are looking to give your next food drive an added element of team building and fun, consider issuing a “CAN challenge” to your team members.