Olean Food Pantry is proud to announce the official tally for our 2025–26 Free Holiday Turkey Distribution, and it’s nothing short of extraordinary! From Nov. 3, 2025, through Jan. 9, 2026, Olean Food Pantry distributed: The Holiday Giving Season is particularly meaningful for us here at Olean Food Pantry. For one, it’s a super busy […]

Let’s borrow an old adage: “It takes a village.” Many of us have heard this phrase our entire lives to describe everything from raising children to making a community impact. When it comes to hunger relief in Western New York, this “it takes a village” mindset has long guided Olean Food Pantry’s work in our […]

Olean Food Pantry has many things to be proud of. Our volunteer-run hunger relief program has been successfully serving individuals and families in need for over 70 years. Our model – our decades-long commitment to addressing food insecurity in our communities – is both efficient and effective for serving tens of thousands of people annually.  […]

We work a lot with numbers. From our Board of Directors down to our volunteer hunger heroes, everyone here at Olean Food Pantry works in ways that are measured and quantified. There’s a purpose to the numbers madness. As a local food pantry with measurable community impact, we must know what exactly we’re doing, how […]

Olean Food Pantry has been in existence for more than 70 years. The mission has always been the same: to provide food assistance in Western New York. People in need wondering where to get groceries for free here in the Olean, NY area haven’t had to look too far since many of our own grandparents […]

Donate to Hunger Relief in Western New York Sometimes here at Olean Food Pantry, we struggle to earn much-needed grant funding. We’re a nonprofit fighting hunger in rural New York, a mission most anyone could easily stand behind. But rural areas in general receive only about 7% of philanthropic spending. That’s not to say we […]

In recent years, local rural food pantries like Olean Food Pantry have become more than just places where families in need pick up free groceries. We’ve become essential community lifelines, stepping up where federal and state systems fall short, especially in rural America. Let’s be honest, dire needs are often overlooked in Western New York. […]

A meal to a family in need provides more than just sustenance. Local food equity provides dignity in powerful ways most people probably couldn’t understand unless they’ve lived with hunger themselves. Stop by your local food pantry and see for yourself. Of course, you wouldn’t be surprised to see shelves of canned goods, freezers stocked […]

At the heart of Olean Food Pantry beats something rare and incredibly powerful: a fully volunteer-run operation with widespread community impact. Every smiling face at check-in, every hand stocking shelves, every person unloading delivery trucks or tending the community garden — they’re all volunteers. No one gets paid. And yet, tens of thousands of families […]

Supporting a rural food pantry. What does that bring to mind? Most tend to think about donations of canned goods and fresh produce. Some also come bearing gifts of diapers and baby formula. While those essentials are the heartbeat of any hunger relief mission, they’re just the beginning of the story — especially for rural […]

Walk through the doors of Olean Food Pantry on any given distribution day, and you’ll witness something quietly powerful: how food pantry donations and other contributions truly make a difference.  Quietly powerful. What does that mean? It means so much is happening behind the scenes to address hunger at a grassroots level. You’ll spot volunteers […]

Local food pantries everywhere believe in a simple yet powerful truth: compassion always wins. Olean Food Pantry’s mission is clear: to fight food insecurity in Allegany, Cattaraugus and Chautauqua counties. But that mission doesn’t start just by providing free food. It starts with understanding. (Think about it: you can’t fight a serious problem without first […]

Today, we’re taking a deep dive into the link between poverty and food insecurity. At Olean Food Pantry, we meet hundreds of families each week whose lives have been shaped — and shaken — by hunger.  While each person’s story is uniquely their own, there’s one undeniable thread that connects them all: financial struggle. Food […]

We’ve learned many lessons about the fight against hunger through the years. Frankly, if we’re not learning, adjusting and gaining new tools to battle food insecurity in our communities, we wouldn’t be doing the job right. One of the greatest lessons? Fighting hunger doesn’t start with food — it starts with people.  More often than […]

Free food distribution to people in need is easy in theory. It’s something we’ve done here at Olean Food Pantry for over 70 years. But the mission has evolved out of necessity through the decades to meet community needs.  Looking to the future of fighting food insecurity, local food pantries like ours must embrace advancements […]

Merely meeting the daily hunger needs in our impoverished communities isn’t enough. As frontline leaders in the War on Hunger, we’re invested in building a sustainable local food pantry to work toward a hunger-free future. At Olean Food Pantry, we’ve learned that true hunger relief is about tomorrow, too. It’s about asking: How do we […]

In a world of abundance, the global impact of food insecurity is a painful paradox. From rural Western New York to communities around the world, hunger continues to impact many millions — billions even. We see this not just in statistics, but in stories of struggle, survival and resilience. Here in the Olean, NY area, […]

Food insecurity is one of the most urgent — yet often overlooked — challenges facing Western New York. At Olean Food Pantry, we see the impact firsthand every day: the tired eyes of parents skipping meals for their kids, the quiet dignity of seniors trying to stretch a fixed income, and the exhausted workers who […]

The good people working local food pantries like ours often say “we’re in the business of food.” But the heart of service is rooted in something much deeper: empathy. In a world that moves fast and often forgets the people who are struggling just to keep up – especially here in impoverished Western New York […]

In a world where screens often replace handshakes and convenience trumps connection, local food pantries like ours remind us of something essential: we all belong to each other. Here at Olean Food Pantry, our commitment to Western New York is to fight hunger while building caring communities. (Related reading: 5 Ways Local Food Pantries Help […]