Chiefs Kingdom donated a total of 264,896 meals during the 2018 Chiefs Kingdom Food Drive (CKFD), bringing the five-year total from the annual drive to over 1.4 million meals donated.
Each year during the months of November and December, the Chiefs make hunger relief a key focus of the organization's outreach efforts. Through a partnership with Hy-Vee and Harvesters, the club has been able to aid in food donation benefiting local families in need. The CKFD officially kicked off on Nov. 27 at Harvesters when members of the Chiefs Community Caring Team, including Chiefs players, Chiefs Cheerleaders and KC Wolf, along with representatives from Harvesters and Hy-Vee helped start packing meal boxes.
"There are too many people in our community that are food insecure, and especially at a time like this during the holidays when so many of us take our families, our friends and our meals for granted," Chiefs CFO and Chairman of the Board at Harvesters, Dan Crumb, said at the CKFD kickoff event. "We hope that through this partnership and food drive that we are able to collect food and money to make the holidays a little more cheerful for some families that may not otherwise have holiday meals to share."
Chiefs fans were able to donate non-perishable food items from Nov. 17 – Dec. 14 at Hy-Vee stores or online by visiting chiefs.harvestersvfd.org. In addition, fans were able to donate to the cause at the Dec. 9 contest against the Baltimore Ravens, as the game served as the official Chiefs Kingdom Food Drive day.
Also contributing to the total number of donations were Chiefs Chairman and CEO Clark Hunt, President Mark Donovan, General Manager Brett Veach and Chiefs linebackers who, on Nov. 14, helped pack food onto trucks with Lift Up America, Tyson and Harvesters for more than 80 local relief organizations. The food packed by that group alone provided 25,000 meals to those in need during the holidays.
"I want to compliment our players who do such a great job of getting out in the community and making a difference, and this Lift Up America food event is just an example of that," Hunt said at the event. "We have our linebackers here today helping load pallets of food from Tyson into these agencies' trucks, and that food will be distributed to people in need throughout the holidays."
The 1.4 million meals donated since 2014 were raised through the annual Chiefs Kingdom Food Drive and the Lift Up America truck packing event. In previous years, the Chiefs have also participated in a separate Thanksgiving meal distribution in partnership with the Derrick Thomas and Neil Smith 3rd and Long Foundation.
