Shipt supports organizations building stronger, more equitable communities

Shipt is proud to award more than $200,000 in new grants to 17 organizations across the United States as part of this year’s Community Impact and Innovation Grant program. Shipt will also continue supporting nine previous grant recipients through an additional $150,000 in grant renewals. 

Strengthening the communities we serve is part of Shipt’s company DNA; we aspire to provide a human touch that makes a difference in people’s lives. Through this program, Shipt invests in local organizations and programs focused on advancing economic mobility and food security and resilience. Local organizations are uniquely equipped to address the specific needs of a community to create lasting, systemic change. 

The selected organizations – from Atlanta, Austin, Texas, Birmingham, Ala., Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Mo., Miami, Minneapolis, New York City, and Oakland, Calif. – plan to use their grants in innovative ways. Grants will support digital skills training for underserved youth, a program to connect farm-fresh produce to communities with access barriers to healthy food, and operations costs for a community garden’s delivery program, among other examples. 

“These trailblazing organizations are on the ground every day, strengthening communities through initiatives that align with Shipt’s own social impact goals,” said Shipt Vice President of Economic and Social Impact Khadijah Abdullah. “We are proud to support these worthwhile causes, and to continue building relationships with changemakers across the country as we work toward our shared mission of building healthier, more resilient communities.” 

Since launching in 2022, Shipt has awarded nearly 60 Community Impact & Innovation Grants, totaling more than $850,000 to organizations focused on food insecurity, economic disparities, and youth workforce development. Across the country, Shipt’s grants have helped supply nearly 500,000 pounds of healthy foods, served more than 250,000 food-insecure individuals, engaged more than 250 small businesses, and supported training and workforce development for more than 1000 learners and workers.   

Read more below on how Shipt’s grants will support local organizations:

Economic Mobility

Computdopt (Chicago): Shipt’s support will go towards supporting Compudopt’s tech education & workforce programming, which includes digital skills training and a free laptop for underserved youth in Chicago.

SCORE Chicago (Chicago): SCORE Chicago provides small business support in the form of 1:1 mentoring, business education workshops and webinars, and online resources to small business owners. Shipt’s grant will support programming, including SCORE Chicago’s 2024-2025 pitch competition for minority small business owners.

College Aim (Atlanta): Shipt will support the expansion of College Aim’s career coaching and internship program for students – with a focus on high-growth and technology-related career pathways. 

Capital IDEA (Austin, Texas): Shipt will support the Career Expressway program designed to help adults from lower-income backgrounds attain living-wage employment in tech-related fields.

Omega BridgeBuilders (Birmingham, Ala.): Shipt will support the organization’s career preparation program for students. With a specific focus on the technology industry, up to 400 students will visit colleges and technical schools and engage in career workshops and job shadowing opportunities to broaden their exposure to a variety of post-secondary STEM career options.

Food Security and Resilience

Farmshare Austin (Austin, Texas): The organization’s Fresh For Less (FFL) program sources fresh, culturally–desired produce from local farms and provides access to neighborhoods experiencing geographic and economic barriers to healthy, nutrient-dense produce and grocery items. Shipt’s grant will support the expansion of Farmshare Austin’s FFL program into five additional languages: Burmese, Vietnamese, Korean, Mandarin, and Arabic.

Make Food Not Waste (Detroit): Shipt’s funding will be used to purchase a blast chiller and accessory equipment for Make Food Not Waste’s upcycling kitchens. The chiller will allow chefs to preserve and make the most of the region’s rescued produce by using high-quality, locally available resources in their food system.

Flanner House (Indianapolis): Shipt will support Flanner House’s Food Justice Culinary and Career Exposure Program which aims to provide young adults, who are either re-entering the community after incarceration or who have dropped out of school, with opportunities to explore careers in the food system. 

Woodlawn United (Birmingham, Ala.): Woodlawn United serves as a leading organization for revitalization in the Birmingham area and partners closely with the City of Birmingham on key initiatives. Shipt will support a feasibility study to bring a new grocery store to the community and set the path for developing a source for Woodlawn residents to access high-quality, healthy, and affordable food.

UAB Live HealthSmart (Birmingham, Ala.): Shipt funds will be used to increase the availability of fresh produce offerings on UAB Live HealthSmart’s Mobile Market and expand hands-on cooking demonstrations and nutritional education opportunities for community members. 

The Birmingham Chapter of The Links, Incorporated (Birmingham, Ala.): Shipt will support the organization’s Linking to Lift: Pathways to Food Security initiative which provides access to locally grown, healthy food options and nutrition education with a focus on accessibility, including mobile markets, pop-ups, and language translation services in underserved neighborhoods.

Buddy System (Miami): Shipt will support the expansion of Buddy System’s Community Fridge program to one new location which will allow access to rescued food to people in need across their targeted communities. 

Kanbe’s Markets (Kansas City, Mo.): Shipt’s funding will help to scale Kanbe’s Healthy Corner Stores program by adding a new small business to their program that will offer fresh and affordable food in neighborhoods where traditional grocery stores are scarce.

Beauty’s Community Garden (Houston): Shipt will support operations costs for Beauty’s Community Garden’s produce delivery program. 

Swipe Out Hunger (Chicago and Detroit): Shipt will support Swipe Out Hunger’s growing work in the Midwest region, specifically programs and advocacy work in Illinois and Michigan, where they support 46+ college and university campuses.

Women’s Foundation of Alabama (Birmingham, Ala.): Shipt will continue to support the organization’s Advancing Alabama Child Care Accelerator to address gaps in access and availability to high-quality childcare in the state, while also creating opportunities for access to higher-wage jobs for female entrepreneurs and parents. 

Saba Grocers Initiative (Oakland, Calif.): Shipt will support the organization’s Fresh 5x initiative that allows corner stores to offer produce incentives to SNAP customers to help make fresh, culturally relevant produce more accessible in underserved neighborhoods.

Grant Renewals

Hunger Free Colorado (Denver): Shipt will continue to support the statewide implementation of the Healthy School Meals program.

Normal Anomaly (Houston): Shipt will continue to support Project Liberate, a three-month small business development and health equity program and pitch competition for Black queer leaders. 

Food Recovery Network (Nationwide): Shipt’s funding will support 30 Food Recovery Network campus chapters across Shipt’s communities to recover and donate surplus food to feed community members, including hosting pop-up farmers markets and mobilizing students to engage in systems-change food systems advocacy.

Goodr Foundation (Birmingham, Ala.): As part of Shipt’s holiday activations, Shipt will support one grocery store pop-up in Birmingham with items designed to support underserved communities. This initiative is an expansion of the signature Pop-Up Grocery Markets in  Goodr’s efforts to end hunger and food waste.

Birmingham Corps (Birmingham, Ala.): Shipt will continue to support the organization’s career services initiative that includes a comprehensive platform to connect minority-owned small businesses with diverse talent.

Urban Growers Collective (Chicago): Shipt funding will support the expansion of the organization’s urban agriculture and community food system development program.

Hmong American Partnership (Minneapolis): Shipt will support Hmong American Partnership’s Economic Prosperity program that helps launch and sustain businesses owned by minority entrepreneurs with immigrant and refugee backgrounds.

Appetite for Change (Minneapolis): Shipt will continue to support the organization’s Community Cooks Meal Boxes, a meal delivery program designed to meet the needs of food insecure families in North Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Equity Advocates (New York City): Shipt’s funds will support community organizing infrastructure, coalition leadership, and increased advocacy capacity for food access nonprofit leaders to address root causes of food insecurity through policy and systems changes in New York City.