Our Story
When my daughter and I first relocated my bookkeeping company to Loudon we didn’t realize there was a food pantry in the same building we moved into. From time to time, we saw people coming in the building and leaving with food. So, we got curious and went to visit the business next door. It was Blessed Hope Food Pantry of Loudon. We spoke with the owners, Betty and Henry Frost, and found they were open a few hours a week. We started to help them restock shelves and carry out food, etc. During this process we got to know the people that came to the pantry for help.
In June of 2008 Betty and Henry Frost decided to retire and were trying to find someone to take over the pantry. Unfortunately there were no takers. This pantry helped people in Belmont, Canterbury, Chichester, Loudon and Epsom NH. We couldn’t stand by and let this happen! So, July 2008 we opened Loudon Food Pantry in the same location as Blessed Hope Food Pantry of Loudon.
Who We Are
Loudon Food Pantry is an independent 501(c)(3) non-profit organization which provides food to households who are struggling to feed themselves. We support Belmont, Canterbury, Chichester, and Loudon NH. We opened our doors in July 2008.
What We Want to Accomplish
We want to reach and assist as many struggling households in our service area as possible.
Are We Making Progress
Yes! we discuss with our households how best to utilize our services so that they can stretch their food stamps and other services further. This means that they spend less on food out of pocket, which makes it easier for them to meet their other financial obligations, such as rent and utilities. We’ve given them cooking advice and recipes so that they can eat healthier while making better use of the food they receive. Many of our households come to us with little to no food in their house and eventually get to a point where they can miss an appointment with us without running out of food.
Do You Have a System to Track Everything
We have developed a propriety method of logging in all incoming items, assigning a fair value to them, labeling each item with an item number and recording which households receive what. This enables us to control the inventory and determine what needs to be obtained.
This system also lets us generate reports for tracking our progress and makes it easier to fill out the monthly and quarterly reports for organizations like the USDA and NH Food Bank.