Refurbished fridges expand access to fresh food at regional pantries

When Mariah Pelzer learned that some of her Boynton Middle School students didn't have enough food at home, she sprang into action to start a food pantry - but where would she get a free fridge to keep fresh food? And even if she found one, who would deliver and install it?

Thanks to outreach by students at the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, Pelzer received a like-new fridge in December, and now the pantry she founded serves more than 15 households in the Ithaca City School District.

"We've been able to help kids out who are literally going home to an empty refrigerator," Pelzer said. "The refrigerator we received was integral to beginning our community market."

This academic year, 73 refrigerators were delivered to pantries in the region, and 10 to 15 more are in the queue. That's thanks in part to the work of students in classes taught by Stephen Shu, professor of practice; Daniel Hooker, senior lecturer; and Adam Brumberg, manager of the Food Industry Management Program, as part of the Grand Challengescurriculum at the Dyson School in the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business. Throughout the fall and spring semesters, the students consulted with Feel Good Fridge, a Whirlpool Corporation program that provides refurbished refrigerators to food pantries.

"It's very efficient. The program helps people with food insecurity and also reduces waste by reusing fridges that would be discarded otherwise," said Mario Penna '25, who worked on the project this spring. "Our No. 1 task this semester was to provide outreach on their behalf locally, both within Cornell and within Tompkins County."

Penna and his classmates contacted local pantries, tapped into existing networks of food distribution, and determined the needs of different organizations throughout the six-county Southern Tier region, where more than 64,000 people are food insecure, according to Feeding America.

Deena Anwar, market manager at Whirlpool Corporation, said that the students connected with more than ten nonprofits weekly and arranged meetings to discuss their initiative. "Our goal for the spring semester was to donate an additional 30 to 40 cold storage units in the area, and I'm happy to report we exceeded this, with 46 units scheduled for delivery as of May."

As a finalist in the Impact Competition, the spring semester team won $2,500, which they donated to Anabel's Groceryon campus.

"The team developed ways to collaborate, support one another, adapt and serve as a champion for both the client and their cause," said Shu, who taught the spring semester course. "They surely ended up with results where one-plus-one was greater than two."

Many of the pantries the students helped are supplied by the Food Bank of the Southern Tier (FBST), which provides about 17 million pounds of food annually, including nearly 4 million pounds of fresh produce, to schools, churches, shelters and other locations throughout the region.

"The students' work is very important," said Amanda Palme, senior community impact manager at FBST. "The collaboration allows us to continue to build capacity with our network pantries, and allow them to better serve their neighbors, with fresh produce, perishable items like dairy, cheese and milk, and the things they really need that often cost a little bit more than they have available in their budgets."

On a recent morning, Penna and two of his classmates volunteered at FBST packing boxes of dinner rolls. They also toured the facility and learned about distribution operations at the 65,000 square foot warehouse.

"It's honestly really surreal to actually be able to see how this entire process works in person," Penna said. "We're really proud of all the work we've done."

Alison Fromme is a writer for the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business.