Did you know Minnesotans made 7.5 million visits to food shelves in 2023? This was over 2 million more visits than in 2022.
You can join the fight to feed your community by donating groceries and personal care items to Open Cupboard.
What We Need Most
Open Cupboard strives to provide our customers with a variety of nutritious food in order to help support a balanced diet. Beyond food, we also provide household and cleaning supplies, diapers, wipes, and pet food as available. Open Cupboard strives to relieve some of the pressures that come with being food insecure.
Below is a list of items that are not always available from food banks and are our current most needed items:
- Fruits and Veggies: fresh from the garden produce, and low sodium/low sugar canned fruits and veggies
- Grains: Boxed cereal, and gluten free items,
- Cooking: spices, olive oil, coconut oil, cooking oil, white or brown sugar, worcestershire sauce, barbecue sauce, salad dressing, fish sauce, and oyster sauce, sesame oil,
- Misc. Food: coffee, tea, soups like Progresso and Chunky Campbells (Hearty pop-top style soups), and microwaveable meals such as soups, ravioli, chili, lentils
- Proteins: Peanut butter, canned tuna, canned chicken, and canned sardines
- Personal Care: Baby diapers (Newborn-Size 6), Pull-Ups (2T-5T), incontinence pads, baby wipes, pads and tampons, shampoo, body wash, toothbrushes and toothpaste, and lotion
- Household Items: Ziplocks and other resealable bags, laundry detergent, dish soap, paper towels, toilet paper and Kleenex or other tissues
- Misc. Other: Paper bags from grocery stores (not lunch bags or plastic)
You can find a list of our most needed donations here: Most Needed Donations
What We Cannot Accept
While Open Cupboard appreciates the willingness to donate items, there are just some things we cannot accept, including:
- Refrigerated or frozen items – we cannot accept these due to food safety regulations
- Open containers of food – unless food is individually wrapped and labeled
- Bread
- Expired foods
- Feeding tube supplies
- Plastic grocery bags
When can I donate food?
You can find our donation hours here.
To donate food and other items, please drive around to the back of our building and ring the doorbell.
Please do not leave bags or boxes of food outside our door – the squirrels might get to them before we do.
Directions to Open Cupboard can be found here.
If you have any questions about donations, contact donate@opencupboard.org or call 651-371-1130.