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Volunteer
 Volunteers are critical to our mission. People of diverse experiences share their time, energy and talents through a variety of jobs. These include stocking the store’s shelves, sorting food, interviewing clients, entering data, bagging groceries, cleaning, repacking perishable food, collecting donated goods, and delivering food to senior citizens. Other opportunities to volunteer throughout the year include the holiday food drive, postal carrier food drive, newsletter collation, and assistance with Kids Café, our summer free lunch program for children.
Volunteers are always needed. Benefits include:
- Gaining safe food handling experience
- Gaining knowledge of basic nutrition
- Gaining work experience and a job reference
- Learning about hunger issues
- Being part of a progressive approach to end hunger locally and nationally
- Assisting fellow community agencies that re also feeding families
- Using your creativity to produce nutritious and palatable meals
- Satisfying your need to contribute to your community
If you would like more information about volunteering at the Food Bank, contact Dorey Rowland. Or download a printable version of our volunteer application form.
Reaching Out To Nearby Communities
Satellite Food Distribution Centers bring hunger relief 
Left: Missoula Food Bank volunteer Ava Cook stocks the shelves at our Missoula location. Once a month, Ava also oversees our satellite food distribution center in Lolo.
Every Wednesday, Ava Cook drives up to Missoula Food Bank from her house in Lolo and gets the shelves ready for the clients we'll see that day. Her volunteer efforts help Missoula Food Bank provide food to those who walk through our doors.
Two years ago, Ava's volunteer job duties expanded. On the first Wednesday of each month, Ava stays closer to her home and oversees a food bank's satellite distribution efforts, operated out of the Lolo Community Center.
"I just want to have the people in Lolo be able to get food," Ava says. "My whole purpose is to give food to people who cannot get up to Missoula."
In Potomac, Dale and Rainey Nortstrum have been operating a satellite distribution center for almost 4 years.
"I've had tough times in the past, and I think it's really important for people to have nutritional food," Rainey explains. "Everybody is welcome to come if they are in need. That's what we're there for."
Rainey says that the local churches and the Potomac school have been very helpful, holding small food drives and doing other things to support the efforts in her small community.
Lolo, too, has welcomed the food bank with open arms, as community members donate food and time to keep the doors open.
At Missoula Food Bank, we are so grateful for the dedication that Ava has shown in Lolo, and that Dale and Rainey have in Potomac. We see these satellite efforts as a clear way to reach out to people who are in need, but who may not be able to come to our facility in Missoula.
We are also grateful to the good people in these communities that allow the use of their Community Center space for food distribution.
The satellite station in Lolo, located at the Community Center, is open on the first Wednesday of each month from 5-7 p.m. In Potomac, the satellite station is open from 5-7 p.m. on the 3rd and 4th Sundays of each month. It is located at the Potomac Community Center. For more information, or to find out how you can help, call 549-0543
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