Schools, churches, businesses, groups, events — all have food drives in December. Their efforts leave the pantries well positioned going into the new year, said Mary Gagala, president of the St. Vincent de Paul food pantry in Iron Mountain.

Lights at the Lake’s open house Dec. 15, for example, did not charge admission to view Lake Antoine Park’s light display but instead encouraged the public to bring a non-perishable food item. That got turned over to the St. Vincent de Paul pantry in late December.

A food drive at Iron Mountain’s Bishop Baraga Catholic School netted 988 pounds for the pantry. Kingsford High School pledged what it collected to the pantry, while the middle school was sending what it got to the Salvation Army Bread of Life Assistance Center, with the two schools competing to see which could gather the most food.

It makes the main challenges this time of year coordinating when and how to take everything in and finding enough storage space and volunteers to sort through the new stock, Gagala said. The pantry at 101 W. A St. in downtown Iron Mountain had a pile in its front room this week from Systems Control, waiting for students to go through for their community service hours.

VOLUNTEER KATHY JO Anderson restocks shelves while Malou Nelson, right, sets up bags for a grocery order at the St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry in Iron Mountain. (Betsy Bloom/Daily News photo)

“We write a lot of thank-you notes,” Gagala said.

The Denim Heart food pantry in Kingsford benefits from such drives as the 2024 TV6 Canathon that ended Dec. 4 with about 75,000 pounds of food collected, along with almost $10,000 in monetary donations, according to the Marquette station. It was distributed to food pantries throughout the Upper Peninsula.

The shelves now are well-filled at Denim Heart Thrift & Pantry, which the Dickinson-Iron Community Services Agency, or DICSA, operates at 621 N. Hooper St. in Kingsford.

“This is the giving season,” said Christina Ureta, director of Denim Heart’s commodity supplemental food program and emergency food assistance program.

Such bounty is well appreciated. As Charles Dickens wrote in “A Christmas Carol,” the holidays are “a time of all others when Want is keenly felt and Abundance rejoices.”

CHRISTINA URETA, LEFT, director of the commodity supplemental food program and emergency food assistance program at Denim Heart Thrift & Pantry in Kingsford, shows off the food pantry area along with Ethan Brown, a program assistant. Denim Heart operates under the Dickinson-Iron Community Services Agency, or DICSA. (Betsy Bloom/Daily News photo)

St. Vincent de Paul in Iron Mountain this Thanksgiving handed out turkeys with all the trimmings to 90 households, feeding 273 people, Gagala said. They repeated that for Christmas with hams replacing turkeys in most of the baskets, she said. While not as many as in November, the number served was still substantial, a worker at St. Vincent de Paul said.

Demand has increased from past years, both for these holiday baskets and for supplies overall, Gagala said.

“It’s new people,” she said, “or people who have not been here for years who now have to come back.” A lot of these new users are younger, with children.

Luckily, the community has kept pace with donations, both in supplies and money. Super One did a promotion for the St. Vincent pantry in November that allowed customers to round up their grocery bill to the next dollar. It raised $3,304.86, Gagala said.

Local grocers, too, have been big contributors in keeping the pantry well provisioned, she said. Even with the donated items, the pantry regularly has to go shopping to fill in gaps and for meats, eggs and fresh items.

MarketPlace, Super One and Aldi’s all offer the St. Vincent pantry good prices on what needs to be purchased, pantry officials said. Super One twice a week allows volunteers to pick up bakery items. Aldi’s lets the pantry take what they pull from the shelves, such as spiral-cut hams that had to be sold or frozen by a certain date. It’ll make for a change, Gagala said, from the usual meats available — hamburger, chicken, hot dogs. Sometimes they get salmon.

A dentist even contributed pork from two pigs bought at local fairs; it was ground up and now sits in bags in one of the pantry’s six freezers. After Super One gave Spam and “everyone took it,” the pantry now regularly stocks it, Gagala said.

The Denim Heart food pantry encourages food donations from the public, as “personally I appreciate when people do the shopping, as I have to do it otherwise,” Ureta said. They have an arrangement with Feeding America West Michigan for buying some supplies, plus income from sales of donated items in the thrift store can be used to purchase locally.

This week, MarketPlace Foods provided the St. Vincent pantry with another 18 paper bags pre-filled with items such as cans of tuna and chicken, spaghetti sauce and pasta, even rolls of paper towels and toilet paper, said Fran Gundlach, vice president of the St. Vincent food pantry and a past president for 10 years. The store invited the public to purchase the bags for donation to St. Vincent de Paul.

To use its services, people are asked to make an appointment with St. Vincent’s food pantry, so staff can determine if they’re better served by other pantries or to get them entered into the system and walk them through the process, Gagala said. The pantry develops a list of their needs and schedules a time and date to come in for food.

People not getting set up in advance has been a problem, Gagala added. “Since COVID, people tend to call the day they need the food,” she said.

They saw that this past Monday, when 28 people from 10 households needed assistance, including one walk-in, Gundlach said.

Once entered, individuals can come in every 30 days, though Gagala added the pantry won’t deny help in a food emergency.

They can utilize other area food pantries, too. Like St. Vincent, Denim Heart Food Pantry allows a visit every 30 days, serving about 60 households a month, with individuals ranging in age from 17 to nearly 90, Ureta said.

Those who come to the Kingsford facility will be asked for basic information, then walked through the pantry area by a staff member to pick out items, Ureta explained. They let participants choose what they want so nothing goes out that won’t be eaten, to avoid wasting food.

With schools now providing all children with free breakfast and lunch, much of the demand at the pantry these days is for dinner fare, Ureta said. Because of that, she suggests those looking to contribute to food pantries put together combinations for preparing full meals, such as the ingredients for chili.

And keep in mind that some meal kits, such as boxed macaroni and cheese, require milk, which the household might not have. A better choice can be a packaged shells and cheese dinner that comes with a cheese sauce packet, Ureta said.

Both pantries also stressed the need for personal care products — shampoo, soap, toothpaste, deodorant and feminine hygiene products — and paper products such as paper towels and toilet paper. These often can’t be purchased through other supplemental programs, said Gundlach of the St. Vincent pantry.

Volunteers at the St. Vincent pantry have stepped forward as well to purchase dog and cat food for those who use their services, Gundlach said. This is particularly important, as donations to the pantry can’t be used for non-human food, she said. Yet “at least half of our people have an animal,” she noted, adding the pet might be their only companionship at home.

The St. Vincent pantry has other services, too — gas cards for out-of-town travel to medical appointments, assistance with utilities to avoid disconnections, even vouchers for boots from Step Ahead and for furniture. But the main function is as a food pantry.

Which makes volunteers its biggest need this time of year, Gagala and Gundlach said.

What comes in with every food drive must be checked for expiration dates — if outdated, it can’t go on the pantry shelves, Gundlach explained. That requires people sort through the piles of cans and boxes.

The St. Vincent pantry has no paid employees, so that all money can go toward supplies and services, they said. It now has about 24 volunteers, some weekly, some more sporadic, most of whom are in their 70s or older.

High school students come to the pantry for public service hours as well but have other obligations, such as sports and jobs, that limit their availability, Gagala said.

Even volunteers to just answer phones can be helpful, Gagala said.

The pantry faces a looming deadline in 2025 as well — Gagala’s second three-year term as president will end Sept. 30, and by rules she can’t hold the position again until she’s had three years off. They need a new treasurer, too, she said.

“People want to help and volunteer but not that much; it’s a lot of work,” Gagala said.

To contact the St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry, call 906-779-0749 or email to svdpimfoodpantry@gmail.com. Hours are 9 a.m. to noon Monday through Friday, though food distribution is on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, with appointments requested so the site can be adequately staffed.

Food pantry hours for DICSA’s Denim Heart are 1 to 2:30 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays and 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Wednesdays. Denim Heart Thrift & Pantry can be reached at 906-767-0132. They also have a Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063662584536.