2025 Impact Report
People We Fed in 2025
Loaves & Fishes provides about a week’s worth of free, healthy groceries, customized for dietary restrictions and cultural preferences, for everyone in a household up to two times a month; offers nutrition education services, including samples, recipes, and cooking classes and videos to help pantry visitors prepare and enjoy the food they receive; and offers 55 volunteer shifts each week to engage 140 community members in the processes of rescuing, inspecting, sorting, packing, and distributing food.
Usambazaji wa Chakula
143,728 individuals in 36,596 households received groceries in 2025.
That’s 12% more households and 13% more individuals than we served in 2024.
We served an average of 195 households/day, 768 households/week in 2025 versus 651 households/week in 2024.
32% of households were visiting Loaves for the first time.
Individuals
13% increase
Customized Carts
lbs. of Food Distributed
Dear Donors & Volunteers,
2025 was another busy year as Loaves & Fishes’ amazing volunteers and staff continued responding to our community’s growing need for food assistance. With generous support from our community—financial contributions, volunteer service, and food donations—we provided free, nutritious groceries to more than 12,000 individuals each month during 2025.
During the year, 2,100 households visited Loaves & Fishes for the first time. We saw more people returning twice each month, as grocery prices continued to climb, increasing by 2.6% in 2025. Through improved processes and greater efficiency, we provided groceries to an average of 195 households every day we were open. As changes to federal food assistance and healthcare benefits begin taking effect this year, we expect demand for our services to remain at these historic levels for the foreseeable future.
When I think back to a time when serving 60 households in a day felt like a busy day, what we are accomplishing now is remarkable.
At the same time, we face a new challenge. Donations of food from both our retail partners and the food bank have declined, making it necessary to purchase more of the food our visitors depend on. In 2026, we have set an ambitious goal of raising twice what we spent on food in 2025 so we can continue purchasing essential proteins like eggs, milk, and meat, along with fresh produce and specialized items for neighbors with dietary restrictions. These purchases are critical to ensuring every visitor receives the nutritious food they need.
Loaves & Fishes could not be the leading provider of free groceries in our community without supporters like you. Thank you so much for your continued generosity, compassion, and belief in our mission. Together, we are helping ensure that every neighbor has access to healthy food and hope.
Wapendwa Marafiki,
Grateful. That is the word that first comes to mind when I look back at the facts, figures, and faces featured in our 2025 Impact Report. Please take a few moments to read about what Loaves & Fishes accomplished last year thanks to incredibly dedicated and caring staff members, enthusiastic volunteers, and gifts of all sizes from our generous donors.
At every distribution, Loaves & Fishes strives to provide free, healthy, and abundant food options for those seeking food assistance. Behind the scenes, Loaves & Fishes rescues food from our local grocery store partners, sorts and packs rescued food and food received from the food bank, and purchases additional items—eggs, milk, and meat—for distribution. We also hold cooking classes at the pantry and other locations, work with local partners like the UVA Mammography Mobile Clinic to provide services to pantry visitors in our parking lot, and share food with other community organizations like The Haven and the PVCC Pantry.
Your support matters. Loaves & Fishes can continue to navigate major challenges, including the steadily increasing price of groceries and substantial changes to SNAP, as well as smaller day-to-day problems—a freezer compressor’s failure or truck repair—because of your commitment to the work we do. Thank you!
Distribution by Region
“We appreciate your support at this time in our lives because times have been really hard for us, and we need all the support we can get!
Thank you so much, Loaves and Fishes!”
— Pantry Visitor
Vizuizi vya Chakula
| Inafaa kwa Moyo | 1% |
| Kisukari-Rafiki | 22% |
| Halal | 5% |
| Hakuna Pork | 6% |
| Fish and/or Shellfish Allergy | 2% |
| Mboga | 1% |
| Milk Allergy | 1% |
| Peanut Allergy | 1% |
| Sodiamu ya chini | 1% |
| Gluten-Free | 1% |
Languages of Visitors
(other than English)
| Kihispania | 18% |
| Dari, Farsi | 3% |
| Pashto | 1% |
| Kiarabu | 1% |
Recipients by Age
Number of Visits during 2025
Vyanzo vya Chakula
2,731,073 lbs. of food received through donations (90.3%) and purchases (9.7%)
Food by Source
| Source | lbs. of Food |
|---|---|
| Food Bank | 1,402,558 |
| Retail Food Vendor | 979,922 |
| Wholesale Food Vendor (purchased) | 233,285 |
| Transportation Company | 26,287 |
| Non-Profit Organization | 22,250 |
| Watu | 19,991 |
| Manufacturer | 11,696 |
| Kanisa | 8,141 |
| Shamba | 7,216 |
| School | 6,085 |
| Business | 4,290 |
| Community Group | 3,085 |
| Kichakataji | 3,042 |
| Health Care Provider | 2,146 |
| Huduma ya Chakula | 826 |
| Total | 2,731,073 |
Food from Vendors
| Shirika | Source | lbs. of Food |
|---|---|---|
| Benki ya Chakula ya Eneo la Blue Ridge | Food Bank | 1,402,558 |
| Companion Animal Fund | Non-profit Organization | 15,657 |
| Costco | Retail Food Vendor | 159,811 |
| Simba ya Chakula (Mill Creek) | Retail Food Vendor | 21,320 |
| Chakula cha Simba (Pantops) | Retail Food Vendor | 27,283 |
| Giant | Retail Food Vendor | 16,001 |
| Kroger (Hydraulic) | Retail Food Vendor | 24,246 |
| Kroger (Mlima wa Rio) | Retail Food Vendor | 27,819 |
| Klabu ya Sam | Retail Food Vendor | 491,650 |
| Wegmans | Retail Food Vendor | 206,059 |
| Dutt & Wagner (purchased) | Retail Food Vendor | 224,596 |
| Transportation Company | Transportation Company | 26,287 |
| JUMLA | 2,731,073 |
Chakula Kusambazwa
Loaves & Fishes distributed 2,731,999 lbs. of food
2,671,063 lbs. of food distributed to people visiting the pantry or their proxies—approximately 6 days of food per person per visit.
14,579 lbs. of food was distributed through partnerships with PVCC Panther Pantry, Piedmont Housing Alliance, Salvation Army, Emergency Food Network, The Haven, Peace Lutheran Church, First Presbyterian Church, Albemarle County Public Schools, Monticello Youth Football, UVA Health.
46,357 lbs. of food waste to farmers to feed their livestock.
Your support makes all this possible!
Community Partners
Loaves & Fishes offers cooking classes to community partners and connects pantry visitors to services they need—healthcare, senior care, legal aid, home energy improvements, employment, children’s books, and other food resources. We do this by inviting local agencies to do car-by-car outreach during our distributions, through referrals, and by identifying partners who can pick up and deliver food.
NUTRITION EDUCATION
“Over the past year, we have partnered with Loaves & Fishes to host two month-long cooking class series for our mentor (Big)/mentee (Little) pairings (Matches). These classes have been very popular with our Bigs and Littles and have been filled to capacity. These sessions provide a fun, hands-on way for our Matches to build skills together while learning about healthy eating habits. The thoughtful planning, engaging instruction, and welcoming environment created by Loaves & Fishes and their team have made these sessions a highlight for our Bigs and Littles.”
— Molly Jackson, Executive Director, Big Brothers Big Sisters
“Just wanted to thank you for planning the Loaves & Fishes class last night! I know it sometimes doesn’t look like “S” is engaged, but all the way home she was talking to me about how long she’s been cooking and how good she is with the knife in the kitchen. Seeing her with that level of confidence was really nice. She also texted me after that her sisters loved the muffins, fruit salad, and especially the egg tortilla … She said she could even make it for them at home for breakfast.”
— From a Big Sister
OUTREACH AT LOAVES & FISHES DISTRIBUTIONS
Market Central, which runs the Farmers Market at IX and the new Starr Hill Market, regularly visited Loaves & Fishes’ distributions in 2025 to educate community members about another way of accessing healthy, local food: by using SNAP benefits at farmers markets and getting double benefits through the Virginia Fresh Match program.
When Book Baskets was no longer able to give children books during COVID, they reached out to see if they could come to Loaves & Fishes’ distributions. By meeting families at their cars, Book Baskets has given out more than 60,000 books, customized by age and gender, since mid-2020.
A Book Baskets volunteer recounted: “I asked a 13 or 14-year-old girl what she liked to read about. She didn’t offer me much wisdom, but when I returned with a few books for her to make a choice, she looked them over and kept one. I asked, “Is that an okay surprise?” The delighted grin on her face was such a rewarding response.”
Another said: “I love when a neighbor can enjoy a bilingual book that helps the family learn English while preserving their original language. I brought a man from Egypt a few books in Arabic. He teared up when he saw that one book’s setting and pictures were from his hometown. He was so happy to be able to share that with his family.”
For the past three years, the Virginia Cooperative Extension, Piedmont Master Gardeners, and Loaves & Fishes have partnered to give away plants, pots, seeds, and dirt to help pantry visitors grow their own vegetables and herbs at home.
Once a month, UVA Cancer Center’s Navigation Outreach Specialist speaks with pantry visitors about cancer screening and helps them find care and resources. This partnership led to Loaves & Fishes hosting a UVA Mobile Mammography Clinic in August 2025, where:
- 11 women received mammograms, met Loaves & Fishes’ dietitian, tried new
recipes and received practical nutrition tips, and picked up food for the week. - 6 individuals’ mammograms were free, thanks to Every Woman’s Life, which offers the scans to qualifying uninsured individuals.
Participants said:
“I recently lost my financial assistance—if it hadn’t been for this [event], I don’t know how I would have gotten a mammogram.”
“This is my first mammogram—I was nervous, but I knew I needed to do it. [Afterward] Everything was fine; it was a quick test!”
“I can make this bean salad for my family … and enough for lunch, too!”
REFERRALS
Loaves & Fishes refers our customers to other agencies offering services they need. Partnership for Accessible Transportation Help (PATH) has been able to connect area residents with transportation solutions they might not otherwise have known about. Partnerships like this demonstrate how community organizations working together can make a meaningful difference in helping people remain connected, independent, and supported.
PROXIES
Community partners schedule weekly or monthly food pickups from Loaves & Fishes to support their customers.
The Crossings provides permanent supportive housing for 60 individuals who have experienced homelessness or some form of chronic health or mental issues. Loaves & Fishes has provided food weekly for different Crossings residents for more than 8 years.
“The residents greatly benefit from receiving healthy and nutritious foods from Loaves & Fishes. The food and information provided to the residents help them make healthy food choices and vastly improve their physical health as well as assisting in improving mental health.”
— Brenda Miller, BSW, The Crossings
The Alliance for Interfaith Ministries (AIM) helps families, seniors, and individuals in Charlottesville and Albemarle County navigate moments of crisis.
“Many of Alliance for Interfaith Ministries’ Secure Seniors clients live alone. Our AIM volunteers delivering food from Loaves & Fishes each month often uncover health and safety issues we would not know about otherwise. While we were in one client’s home delivering groceries, she fainted. AIM was there to call 911. She was admitted to the hospital and diagnosed with a treatable heart condition and no longer has fainting spells.
Our Loaves & Fishes grocery delivery serves not only food to our vulnerable senior clients but allows us to engage with our vulnerable seniors and learn of their needs.”
— Debbie McVey, AIM
Loaves & Fishes has been a valuable resource to International Neighbors’ newcomer community for over a decade, with no year more important than this one. Because of a reduction in federal nutrition assistance, Loaves & Fishes has become a local lifeline for refugee and SIV families. Families with transportation can pick up their own groceries, providing a sense of dignity and choice to newcomers from over a dozen countries with, understandably, unique food preferences. Additionally, a team of International Neighbors volunteers picks up pre-packaged groceries and delivers them every other week to newcomer families without transportation. Many times, this simple delivery becomes an invitation to tea and a conversation with a new friend. Loaves & Fishes does more than nourish bodies—their generosity is a catalyst for welcome and belonging in Charlottesville.”
Did You Know?
Since 2020, volunteers have answered Loaves & Fishes’ phone from home for four hours each day, contributing more than 5,000 hours of service. They answer questions about our hours and services, schedule Tuesday appointments for customers who prefer not to use the website, assist with donation inquiries, and provide a warm, welcoming voice to everyone who calls.
We are deeply grateful to Amy (Saturday), Kate (Monday), Jean (Tuesday), Gloria (Wednesday), and Rebecca (Friday) for their ongoing commitment, and to Gretchen for her years of dedicated service on Thursdays.
Our phone volunteers also support the community in other ways.
Kate leads the Birthday Brigade, which sends birthday cards to Loaves & Fishes customers turning 70!
Gloria helps register guests at the Unitarian Universalist Church food pantry on the first Friday of each month.
Rebecca hosts two WTJU radio programs: Eclectic Woman (Tuesdays 12 – 2 pm) and In the Spirit (Sundays 9 – 10 am).
Amy is the Immediate Past Chair of Loaves & Fishes’ board of directors and has served nearly
9 years on the board.
Interested in joining our phone volunteer team? Contact Volunteer Manager Tracy Arbaugh at volunteers@cvilleloaves.org to learn more.
Tunawapenda wajitolea wetu!
- 226 new volunteers in 2025
- 553 volunteers contributed 14,786 hours, saving L&F the cost of 7 additional full-time staff
- 295 repeat volunteers
5+ years: 45
4 years: 14
3 years: 24
2 years: 60
- 155 volunteers also made a monetary gift to L&F
| Saa za Kujitolea | # of Volunteers |
|---|---|
| 400+ | 1 |
| 200–399 | 7 |
| 100–199 | 42 |
| 50–99 | 43 |
| 25–49 | 56 |
| 3–24 | 245 |
| chini ya 3 | 159 |
Athari Mwaka Kwa Mwaka
| Mwaka | Lbs. of Food | % Inaweza kuharibika | # ya Watu waliolishwa | Lbs./Mtu | Milo/Mtu |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 2,731,999 | 68% | 143,728 | 19.0 | 15.8 |
| 2024 | 2,855,467 | 66% | 128,794 | 22.17 | 18.5 |
| 2023 | 2,453,030 | 64% | 100,235 | 24.47 | 20.4 |
| 2022 | 1,946,580 | 69% | 67,134 | 29.00 | 24.2 |
| 2021 | 2,110,901 | 68% | 52,548 | 40.17 | 33.5 |
Past Three Years
- Average net lbs. distributed: 2,681,738
- Average operating expenses: $891,520
- 3.01 lbs. distributed per dollar spent
- 2.51 meals per dollar spent
Food Weight Distributed by Year
Tunathamini sana msaada wako!
Fundraising in 2025
Total cash raised: $2,167,180
(Total raised in 2024: $1,312,621)
Past Three Years
| Donation Amount | 2025 | 2024 | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|
| $150,000 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| $ 25,000 - $ 99,999 | 19 | 8 | 3 |
| $ 15,000 - $ 24,999 | 19 | 13 | 7 |
| $ 10,000 - $ 14,999 | 16 | 13 | 12 |
| $ 5,000 - $ 9,999 | 42 | 22 | 23 |
| $ 2,500 - $ 4,999 | 45 | 33 | 30 |
| $ 1,000 - $ 2,499 | 133 | 135 | 125 |
| $500 - $999 | 104 | 136 | 99 |
| $ 100 - $ 499 | 195 | 308 | 251 |
| $ 1 - $ 99 | 52 | 121 | 204 |
2025 Loaves & Fishes Donors
Loaves and Fishes is grateful to all who support our mission.
2025 Board of Directors
Formed in 2011, Loaves & Fishes is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization led by a Board of Directors.
Maafisa wa Bodi
Jennifer L. Sulzberger, Chair
Nate Hixson, Vice Chair
James J. Sullivan, CPA, MBA, Treasurer
Molly B. F. Walls, Secretary
Amy O’Leary, Immediate Past Chair
Bodi ya Wakurugenzi
Esmeralda Amos
Alice K. Brown
Larry C. Brown
Lorna Gerome
John Griffin
Ray Gilmer
Stephanie Lyman
William J. Schoeler
Jane Colony Mills, ex-officio