March for Meals 2023

March for Meals is an annual celebration for Meals on Wheels member organizations, and we need your love and support to feed change in Montpelier. FEAST Senior Meals has been Montpelier's Meals on Wheels program for over 10 years. Operating from the Montpelier Senior Activity Center, FEAST delivers over 300 meals a week to older adults in Montpelier and Northern Berlin.

This year, we're asking for your help in sustaining FEAST's operations and nurturing this valuable program. We're asking for your help to expand FEAST into medically tailored meals, add more Meals on Wheels routes, and offer more congregate meal events for our community. Your support means more older adults will ensure they are receiving the proper nutrition they deserve. Scroll on to learn more about how to donate and sponsorship benefits.

The Root to Fork Model of Healthy Living...

Even though we eat every day, we rarely think about where our food comes from. But we also know that without studying our food systems, many deleterious effects go unnoticed and unresolved. That is why, as the City of Montpelier's Meals on Wheels program, the Montpelier Senior Activity Center’s FEAST Senior Meals program has begun to develop a Root to Fork model of serving meals to our meal recipients. Each week, we feed hundreds of meals to older adults in Montpelier and Northern Berlin based on this model and provide them with locally-sourced nutrition.

Here's the Root to Fork model in three steps:

We first grow our food, which begins at the FEAST Farm. This city-owned, no-till farm, located at Home Farm Way in Montpelier, supplies the FEAST program and local food pantries with thousands of pounds of fresh produce each growing season. There are numerous benefits to our FEAST program owning its own farm, but chief among them all is the ability to control the sourcing and food quality for most of our meal ingredients. We harvest greens, like kale and spinach, root veggies, like carrots and turnips, and staple crops, like potatoes and corn.

Any excess produce does not go to waste! We sell supplemental crops at our FEAST Farm Stand, detailed below, and we donate hundreds of pounds of produce to local food pantries, such as Just Basics.

The next step in the process is processing and distributing our produce grown at the FEAST Farm. A big component of that work stems from the FEAST Kitchen and our new FEAST Farm Stand. The FEAST Kitchen's many rock star volunteers help process all of the produce coming from the farm starting in late spring through late fall. These veggies will be made into healthy, nutritious dishes that are served to Meals on Wheels recipients 5 days a week.

Beyond that, whole veggies are sold at below-market price for older adults at our farm stand. The FEAST Farm Stand is more than just a place to grab cheap veggies though-- it serves a community hub for live events and important discussions on local food access and changing our local food systems for all. Equity in nutrition is a key mission of FEAST, which is why our Meals on Wheels program has been on-going for more than a decade.

As the City of Montpelier's Meals on Wheels program, FEAST Senior Meals is a lifeline for many older adults in our community. We deliver meals 5 days per week with the help of dozens of volunteer drivers. We also serve curbside meals for the public twice per week, and we have recently re-introduced congregate meals back into the FEAST Kitchen after a pandemic pause. These meals offer more to our older adult recipients than just nutrition, Our drivers make a point to develop long-lasting relationships and extend some social connection into the lives of our recipients.

As you can see, FEAST is a complete cycle of nutrition from root to fork. If you are inspired by our program, we humbly request you read on and join us on March 18th for our MFM Gala!

Sponsorship Benefits

Each perk is matched in successive levels	Perk Description
$100+ Carrot Contributor	Get a personal thank you on our website and social media, plus have your logo shown at the March Gala.
$250+ Asparagus Advocate	Small logo included on our official March for Meals flyer.
$500+ Garlic Guardian	Receive an official March for Meals Sponsor window decal.
$1,000+ Potato Protector	Large logo included on our official March for Meals flyer.
$1,500+ Root to Fork Champion	Have a featured business article and/or video included on our online channels through the culmination of FEAST’s season with the Harvest Meal in September 2023.
$3,000+ Sustainability Maven	The opportunity to speak at our March for Meals Gala amongst community leaders.
$5,000+ Hunger Demolisher	Have a featured article in our MSAC newsletter that reaches over 1,500 readers each month.

Every year, March for Meals is celebrated across the United States to commemorate the signing of the legal amendment, which supported the growth of nutrition programs for older adults, commonly known as Meals on Wheels. This March, the Montpelier Senior Activity Center’s FEAST Senior Meals program invites you to support the work we provide our Montpelier community year-round to feed our older adults from root to fork.

In the following panels, you will see the sponsorship levels for both small and large businesses in our community. These perks do not fully symbolize the gratitude we have for you as a sponsor, but we hope it inspires you to take action as a local food supporter. And each level up includes the preceding levels as well!

Sponsor us online or call our office: 802-262-6284

FEAST Senior Meals is the City of Montpelier's Meals on Wheels program for over a decade. Each week, we provide older adults in need with hundreds of fresh and nutritious meals utilizing the Root to Fork model. FEAST is more than just a Meals on Wheels program. We have a farm growing food for our meals, a farm stand to distribute excess produce to needy adults of all ages, and a ktichen hosting group meals, events, and programming inside of the Senior Activity Center. Visit the FEAST main page to see all of our offerings: www.montpelier-vt.org/FEAST.