Most recently, two main events dominated the Austin entertainment scene: Austin City Limits Festival and Formula One.
Austin City Limits Festival transformed Austin’s beloved Zilker Park into a music arena with eight stages. The 15-year-old festival spanned across two weekends giving music lovers a chance to see some of their favorite bands as well as who to watch out.
With only one week in between to catch your breath, Formula 1 United States Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas brought the best of the best race car drivers for the ultimate racing competition.
Though each event has its own trademark, they both had one thing in common: delicious food.
But with any large event, there’s always food leftover. Instead of throwing the food away, the vendors from each event decided to make a difference in the lives of Central Texans and donate the food to the Food Bank.
Thanks to the ACL Festival and the Circuit of the Americas, we were able to rescue a total of 14,303 pounds of food that will help the 471,000 food-insecure individuals in the Food Bank’s 21 county-service territory.
We received 2,741 pounds of food from ACL Fest, which included celery, onions, vegetable lasagna, tortillas, avocados and much more.
Similar to the donation we received from ACL Fest, pallets of food from COTA arrived at the Food Bank with boxes filled with kiwis, cucumbers, blackberries, spinach, cut bell peppers, mini pies and more. We were able to rescue 11,562 pounds of food from F1 this year.
The Food Bank has been able to rescue a total of 84,207 pounds of food from both events since 2012.
With an estimated 70 billion pounds of food wasted in America, the Food Bank is always looking for ways to reduce waste in Central Texas. Last year, we were able to rescue more than 18.5 million pounds of food.
With one in six Central Texans facing hunger, we can’t thank the vendors and event organizers for doing their part in helping reduce food waste. Their donations will help families in need, especially with the holiday season approaching.
