“#HashtagLunchbag is a movement dedicated to utilizing
social media to bring awareness to and eliminate hunger in local communities.”
#HashtagLunchbag was born on Christmas Day 2012 in a Los Angeles apartment with just a small group of friends. The intent was simple, to prepare and deliver a hearty and well-balanced meal to our local homeless community. Friends all chipped in a few bucks before taking a quick trip to the grocery store and purchasing a few goodies. They invited over a few more friends to help assemble the lunch bags, blasted some music, and then hit the streets.
Not uncommon for this day and age, they decided to share their experience via social media and crafted the unique #HashtagLunchbag tag. Before they knew it, other friends starting asking about #HashtagLunchbag and requesting invites to the next outing. That’s when they knew they were on to something BIG and had to make this an ongoing event.
Living in an era where digital media reigns and word-of-mouth chatter quickly spreads, they realized that their grassroots effort had the potential to go viral. In less than two years, hundreds of volunteers have helped to spread the #HashtagLunchbag movement.
#HashtagLunchbagDayton started May of 2014 and was introduced here by Ashley Yancey. She got involved in NYC and decided to bring it to her hometown after a guy from Cleveland at the NYC event was talking about how he started the movement in his town of Cleveland then asked her “What have you done for your city?”
She reached out to Jordan Hockett (the man behind DaytonBaton) to coordinate the first event and he’s been quietly doing it monthly ever since, since she lives in NYC.
Dayton follows the same concept of putting together lunch bags (sandwich, chips, fruit, cookie, water) with the # inside a heart on one side and a positive post-it note on the other side of the bag.
Then volunteers distribute the lunches to those living on the streets and to outreach centers such as St. Vincent DePaul, YWCA, House of Bread, DayBreak and neighborhoods in need. Jordan shares, “I host the events at local establishments as I’m about the community and the small businesses. The first was at Agnes All Natural Grill and all others have been at Wheat Penny.”
Jan volunteer crew: 9 people/96 lunches/countless socks, hats, scarfs and gloves … You can do a LOT with a LITTLE!
You can make a difference by donating a few hours this Sat, Feb 28th at 10am at the American Czechoslovakian Club, located at 922 Valley St. All they ask is volunteers bring a minimum donation of $10 to help cover food costs. Socks, hats and gloves are appreciated, too. All ages are welcome, so teach your children the importance of giving back.
#HashtagLunchbagDayton
Can’t make it? DONATE .
Can you post the dates of future events so we can plan to be the there? Would love to be able to participate!