Community Giving

At Whole Foods Market, we are active participants in our community. We are extremely proud of our community involvement and the relationships that we continue to make each month! We strive to make a difference.

We maintain a Community Board just outside our elevator bank on the main floor of the store.  All items submitted for consideration for posting on the community board must either be free to the public or benefit an area non-profit only, and items will be posted for no more than three weeks.  We do not allow posting of advertisements for businesses, for-profit events, business cards, real estate, etc... Any item that you would like posted should be left at our Customer Service desk for approval by our Community Liaison.  Any posted directly on the community board without approval will be removed and discarded.

We do not allow solicitation by outside groups in front of or inside the store.  This includes sales of items to benefit local non-profit groups or schools.  It is a company-wide policy.

DONATIONS

Each individual Whole Foods Market has a monthly budget used to donate quality food to nonprofit organizations serving our local community.  Our store donations go to nonprofits serving Anne Arundel County, Prince Georges County and Kent County only.  All donation requests must be received on the store's donation request form only, we do not accept donation requests via letter, email, phone or any other method for request.  All donation requests must be received at least eight weeks prior to the day the donation is needed and must include a federal 501c3 tax exempt number in order to be considered.  Please note that it is our policy not to give monetary donations.  We will notify you within two weeks if we can honor your donation request.  If your organization receives a donation, we require an acknowledgement letter be sent to our Community Liaison, Amy Chase, after the event.  Donation requests forms are attached below.  Please note that our donation budget has been fully allocated through December 31st and we cannot consider any additional requests that fall before January 1, 2010. Download Donation Application (pdf)

5% DAYS

Our Community 5% Days are one meaningful way we give back to our community. On designated days throughout the year a total of 5% of the day's net sales are donated to local non-profit organizations. Customers help support our selected organizations just by shopping on these 5% Days.

If your 501(c)3 non-profit organization is interested in applying to become a 5% Day recipient, please fill out the application attached below.

Download Community 5% Day Application (pdf)

NICKELS FOR NONPROFITS

Our Nickels for Nonprofits program benefits local 501c3 nonprofits in Anne Arundel County,  Prince Georges County and Kent County.  For each reusable bag that is brought in by our customers, we give either a 5¢ bag refund directly to them or give the the option of a taking a wooden nickel and putting it in a donation box for one of two featured non-profits.  When the donation cycle of three months is complete, we will cut a check to the featured nonprofits for the amount donated by customers. The Nickels for Nonprofits application form is attached below. Our current beneficiaries are the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Creating Communities, they will continue to receive the wooden nickel donations through November.  As of August 25th, the wooden nickel program has raised $78.25 for CBF and $64.65 for Creating Communities.

Download Nickels for Nonprofits Application (pdf)

OUR INVOLVEMENT WITH

FOOD LINK

Every day, we donate our surplus produce, bakery and Prepared Foods items to Food Link, our local food bank partner.  Food Link has been committed to helping those in need in our local community since 1991 by distributing over 22 million pounds of food and other essentials in that time. More information about Food Link may be found at http://www.foodlinkmaryland.org/

 

DONATE YOUR USED CELL PHONES

Whole Foods Market is once again happy to announce that it will be collecting used and unwanted cell phones on behalf of Secure the Call, a local non-profit organization that collects old cell phones and redistributes them to the community to be used as 911 emergency-only phones. Secure the Call is coalition of over 125 community outreach organizations including Senior Citizen Centers, Battered Women's Shelters, Police and Sheriff's departments. Secure the Call collects the phones and then wipes them clean of all previous customer information. They then distribute the phones to their coalition partners who in turn give them out to the community.

Please bring your old phones and charges and look for our new cell phone collection barrel near the Cafe. Thanks for your help!