A unique and growing effort to combat food insecurity in the D.C. region expanded Thursday as the program added another location in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
“‘Feed the Fridge’ is a disruptive approach to solving hunger,” said Mark Bucher, founder of the program.
Bucher co-owns the local Medium Rare restaurants and launched his Feed the Fridge program last summer in response to food insecurity that developed during the coronavirus pandemic.
The program stocks refrigerators around the area with free meals that anyone can take, no questions asked.
Each refrigerator is loaded with up to 100 meals each.
“We buy our meals from local restaurants and stock our refrigerators every day with them,” Bucher said. “We work with the restaurants to create a nutritious, balanced meal.”
There are 26 local restaurants that participate, producing food for the refrigerators.
The refrigerator that was added in Prince George’s County on Thursday marks the program’s 22nd fridge. There were already refrigerators located around D.C. and Montgomery County, Maryland.
“Prince George’s County reached out and asked for our help,” Bucher said. “We connected with the Latin American Youth Center in Riverdale, which we thought was a great place to start.”
Bucher said he wants to continue expanding across the area and adding more locations.
“We are really looking for corporate sponsors and others to get involved with us and make sure that this can be sustainable,” he said.
By the end of 2021, Bucher’s goal is to deliver more than 500,000 meals to the refrigerators.
