Pantries of Plenty exceeds expectations: Food pantry brings in nearly 30,000 pounds of donations for Mission Granbury

Mission Granbury’s newly acquired Pantries of Plenty food drive exceeded expectations, with close to 30,000 pounds of items donated to the nonprofit organization.

Previously operated under the name Live Thankfully, the food drive was run by local pediatric dentist Dr. Dave Purczinsky and his wife Dana. Due to some minor health concerns, however, Dave decided to pass on the responsibility of the food drive to Mission Granbury this year.

Preparations began as donation boxes and tubs were placed in several local businesses and at every GISD campus. An additional week of the food drive was added to combat the need caused by the pandemic, with the fundraiser taking place from Oct. 10 through Nov. 11.

Food items like ramen noodles, cereal and peanut butter were collected, as well as pet food and nonfood donation items like deodorant, shampoo and body wash.

Pantries of Plenty held a “party” on Nov. 19 in which volunteers helped to sort all of the donated items and to calculate a total of how many pounds of food items were collected.

“We are still calculating,” said Andi Luna, emergency assistance network coordinator for Mission Granbury. “The count is at 24,728, but that doesn’t include 3,000 before Saturday, and donations are still coming in. We are expecting it to be around 30,000 by the end.”

Jean Bondy, director of community partnerships for Mission Granbury, said she was overwhelmed by the community’s response to the food drive.

“This community is overwhelmingly generous,” she said. “I think what we brought to the table was building upon what Dr. Dave already had and expanding the number of people invited to participate.”

Luna said Pantries of Plenty went “beyond her expectations.”

“I'm very humbled, and appreciative to say the least,” she said. “I'm also just excited about how many people we're gonna get to feed and just how well we're gonna get to feed them. This isn't just random stuff people brought in; there was thought put into it, and it was very intentional.”

She said she appreciated seeing how many students put effort into helping their own community.

“The DECA club had a special competition. They’re doing this for their state project to go to competition, so they really made a big deal about it,” she said. “Heritage Christian Academy, they had their bins three days, and they brought in around 1,000 pounds themselves. All the kids went and got 50 cans each. So many pitched in and contributed. It is overwhelming generosity.”

Luna said she is excited to be able to provide quality food items to the children and seniors in the community for the next year.

“Our backpack program, we send out 150 bags a week, so we're gonna be able to send them good stuff, not just what we could find,” she said. “It's the quality that we're gonna be able to give people that I'm so appreciative about, because our seniors are going to actually get hearty meals and pet food. Everyone will be able to feed their pets without stress. We had so many of the vets that pitched in and were so generous, so we want to make sure that all the parts of their lives are taken care of — and with all this, it can be — so we're just very grateful.”

Mission Granbury is located at 3611 Plaza E. Court and can be reached by calling 817-579-6866. The weekly drive-through food pantry takes place from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. on Tuesday and Thursday and 3-7 p.m. on Wednesday.