Community Food Share is the Feeding America food bank serving Boulder and Broomfield Counties, based in Louisville, Colorado. It is where every frozen Nice Rice roll goes after it leaves our kitchen in Lafayette. We make the food. They get it to people across two counties, through programs we could never run ourselves.
What is Community Food Share?
Community Food Share is a regional food bank. It collects, stores, and distributes food through its own pantry, mobile pantries, and a network of partner agencies. By its own count, it distributed more than 11 million meals across Boulder and Broomfield Counties last year and works with more than 40 partner agencies.
How big is the need in Boulder and Broomfield Counties?
Bigger than most people guess. Community Food Share, citing Feeding America's Map the Meal Gap report, puts it this way:
People without reliable access to enough food: Boulder County: more than 37,000; Broomfield County: more than 7,800
Average cost of one meal: Boulder County: $4.45; Broomfield County: $4.19
Yearly food budget shortfall: Boulder County: over $31 million; Broomfield County: over $6.2 million
Those numbers come from Community Food Share's own summary, based on 2023 data. They also note that 45% of people facing hunger in Boulder County earn too much to qualify for SNAP.
Why does Nice Rice deliver to a food bank instead of handing out food directly?
Because a food bank can move far more food than a cooler on a sidewalk. Our street drops topped out at roughly 100 rolls: Drop 36 was 96, Drop 37 was 99, and Drop 38 was 94. A food bank already has the cold storage, trucks, and partner network. When we freeze rolls and deliver them in bulk, they reach people in places we would never get to on our own.
What does each side do?
The split is simple:
Nice Rice buys ingredients, cooks rice rolls in batches, wraps them in foil, and freezes them.
Nice Rice delivers the frozen rolls in bulk to Community Food Share in Louisville.
Community Food Share stores the food and distributes it through its pantry, mobile pantries, and partner agencies.
Each of us does the part we are built for.
Why does a rice roll fit a food bank?
A rice roll is rice, eggs, butter, and spices in foil. It costs us about 50 cents to make, so $1 covers two rolls. Frozen, it is easy to count, stack, and store, which is how a food bank already moves food. We wrote more about that in why Nice Rice freezes its rice rolls.
How can you help?
Two ways. You can support Community Food Share directly at communityfoodshare.org. Or you can fund the next batch of Nice Rice rolls headed to their dock. Every delivery goes into our Drops archive.