Hope for the City
Hope for the City uses corporate surplus as a tool to fight poverty, hunger, and disease.
Hope for the City is a privately funded, 501(c)3 relief organization that was established by Dennis and Megan Doyle in 2000 to fight poverty, hunger and disease by utilizing corporate surplus. The Minnesota-based, non-profit organization collects overstock products from top retailers, medical companies, and food distributors nationwide and donates the items to people in need locally, across the country and around the world. Since its inception, Hope for the City has donated approximately $400 million in wholesale value of goods.
Locally
Hope for the City distributes corporate surplus to non-profit organizations that serve the poor in the Twin Cities and surrounding areas. Hope for the City makes an incredible monthly impact on the non-profit organizations it serves. Our Community Partners reach 30,000 individuals in need each month. Because of their partnership with Hope for the City, they can now reach 40,000 individuals. In other words, Hope for the City touches approximately 10,000 individuals in need each month.
Hope for the City helps create healthier communities by providing an easy way for corporations to move their surplus, receive a tax donation, and serve the poor. Helping those in poverty helps make a stronger community. A healthy community provides the basis for the economy to flourish. It’s a circle that starts at the loading dock of local business.
Internationally
Hope for the City delivers medicines, medical supplies and equipment to developing countries all over the world. With our access to medical resources, we are able to equip a 4-5 story hospital with everything from hospital beds and exam tables, to supplies and medicines. One new resource, which we call “A Hospital in a Box” can literally get a hospital started anywhere in the world with just one container.
By equipping doctors with much needed medical equipment and supplies, we enable them to make quicker and more accurate diagnosis and care for the sick more effectively. Even everyday medical supplies like Band-Aids are often no where to be found in poverty stricken hospitals and clinics in the developing world. The equipment the United States was using 15-20 years ago is what the developing world needs now.
What we do
Hope for the City serves the poor by being a conduit between those who have and those who have need. We procure corporate surplus and distribute it freely to the poor through a network of non-profit organizations that we call Community Partners.
A Community Partner is a non-profit organization committed to serving those in need through programs, service, or long-term relational care. Each non-profit organization goes through an application to become a Hope for the City Community Partner.
We communicate to our Community Partners through e-mail. Each week we send out an e-mail announcing what is in the warehouse for distribution. If a Community Partner can utilize the products, they schedule an appointment and come to our warehouse with the appropriate vehicles to pick it up.
Hope for the City distributes on a weekly basis. We try to empty our 20,000 square foot warehouse each week, so we can begin to fill it again the following week. We distribute a broad range of corporate surplus including food, clothing, school and office supplies, hotel and restaurant equipment, as well as medical supplies and equipment.
Hope for the City works with an extensive national network of organizations similar to us. We call these organizations our National Partners. If we have an over abundance of a specific product, we give it to our National Partners who in turn give it to the poor in their states. They also give to us their overages. Our National Partnerships enable us to pick up and distribute product anywhere in the lower 48 states.
From a procurement standpoint, this is a benefit to national corporations who have multiple locations. We can serve every location, branch, and distribution center of a national business with speed and efficiency.
Our National Partners also enable us to respond quickly to national disaster areas with food, water, and resources for recovery.
Locally or internationally, we believe every city should have a Hope for the City.