Hunger Action Month is a time when St. Mary’s and other food banks ask corporations and individuals in their communities to take up the fight against hunger.

It’s also a time when U-Haul International has gladly stepped up to the plate again and again.

U-Haul presented St. Mary’s with a check for $17,500 to fulfill its Food Drive Box title sponsorship; delivered 776 pounds of food donated by Team Members during the annual U-Haul September food drive; and packed 1,152 emergency food boxes in its two-hour volunteer shift on Tuesday at the St. Mary’s warehouse at 2831 N. 31st Ave. in Phoenix.

Sept. 18 officially marked U-Haul Day on the St. Mary’s Hunger Action Month calendar. Learn how you can get involved and help St. Mary’s at firstfoodbank.org.

Volunteer Experience

“I love being a part of a group that has the same mission and passion to help our communities in need,” U-Haul retirement benefits analyst Kat Miles shared after the volunteer event.

“I have experience growing up in poverty, being in a foster home and coming to the state as a refugee when I was 5. We are privileged to live in a country that helps those who are not able to provide for themselves. We should help and provide as much as possible since we are all striving for the same quality of life. I am very proud to work for a company that has so much passion to help those in need.”

Jerry Brown, St. Mary’s Director of Media Relations, spoke to the two dozen U-Haul volunteers in attendance and the other companies represented about the importance of their corporate partners and sponsorships.

In just the last three years, Brown noted, U-Haul support has helped provide meals for more than 400,000 hungry Arizonans – many of them children.

Community Objectives

U-Haul, which operates throughout the U.S. and Canada, enriches the communities in which it does business by assisting charitable organizations that address the most basic human needs: food, clothing and shelter. This has long been the scope of the Company’s community outreach because U-Haul views mobility as a basic need for every family, and works to keep costs low to meet that need. Founded by a WWII Navy veteran and his wife in 1945, U-Haul is also a proud supporter of many military and veteran groups and causes that provide for these basic needs.

Read more about what U-Haul is doing in the community by clicking here.