Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes
- Food pantries in Salt Lake City saw an average increase of 25% to 35% in demand in 2024 compared to 2023.
- The Utah Food Bank, crucial for pantry supplies, cut revenue by 20% to allocate more funds for food.
- Pantry leaders anticipate higher demand in 2025 and emphasize collaboration and awareness.
SALT LAKE CITY — Glenn Bailey and his staff run one of the largest and busiest food pantries in the Salt Lake City area. In 2024, they discovered things could get a whole lot busier.
Slightly more than 10,000 people were fed by the pantry during the year, equating to 5,854 households — some with more than one visit to the pantry. In fact, the Crossroad Urban Center's two pantries that Bailey runs saw more people in 2024 compared to 2023, a range of 29% to 35% more through 2024, according to Bailey.
The center receives food from the Utah Flood Bank, Welfare Square, and a few food drives spread out throughout the year but mostly during the holidays. That once was more than enough food to feed everyone, but things are tightening up now.
"Even with all that food, we still find ourselves scrambling some months," Bailey said. "The number of people who need help has gone up. It's understandable. Their rent is higher ... they have to find money somewhere. Everything is going up, same with utilities. People are struggling to get by."
Staff at the 19 other public food pantries in Salt Lake County agree.
Every food pantry in Salt Lake County but two have said, upon analyzing their data between 2023 and 2024, they have seen an increase in demand between 25% and 35%. Households can visit more than one food pantry in the county if they would like, according to pantry staff. This would mean people who visit Crossroads, for example, can also visit the pantry at the First Baptist Church or Kearns Food Pantry.
It also follows that if Crossroads sees a 29% increase in demand, the other pantries would see an increase close to that amount, as well, due to household members — many of whom live in two-paycheck households, pantry leaders say — visiting more than one pantry a month.
Regardless of how many pantries residents visit, a look at the numbers tells pantry directors they're helping more people than they've ever helped before, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Before COVID, we would see 50 to 60 people a day in the pantry. Now, when I look at the last 11 months, I see we're seeing a range between 200 and 300 a day. That's a big increase," said Cibell Morales, director of Hildegarde's Food Pantry in Salt Lake City. "And it looks like 90 of those people we served were seniors — 90 seniors a day, who probably don't have enough retirement to pay their bills. So, we're seeing more people and new people."
The Utah Food Bank is the source of food for many food pantries known as partner agencies to the organization. All pantries are heavily dependent on the Utah Food Bank, which works with Feeding America to get food to pantries and, hence, to those in need.
But as Morales described, if something happens to the Utah Food Bank, such as not getting enough produce, for example, "We'd have to give people less food."
For 120 years, the food bank has provided food to each of the 29 Utah counties. With 13% of the Utah population designated as food insecure by the Utah Food Bank — in other words, individuals who do not know when their next meal will come — the food bank has been providing millions of pounds of food to Utahns everywhere, 65.5 million pounds in 2023 alone.
Food bank leadership noted they are aware of the increase in demand for food assistance — and other forms of help such as getting clothes, baby diapers, utility payment help and more. They also know that they need to work on cutting revenue so dollars can go toward food purchases. Between 2023 and 2024, the agency cut revenue by 20%.
Things are tough, for certain, and pantry leaders expect to help even more people in 2025 than 2024. But by sharing food, holding food drives at different times of the year, rather than mostly at the holidays, and collaborating with each other, pantry leaders believe they can at least try to figure out ways to ease the heavy burden on families
"So many things are out of our control, and that's the scary part," said Ginette Bott, president and CEO of the Utah Food Bank. "People need to recognize, at any given moment, this could happen to me, to you. ... In that case, we can remember how we would want people to treat us in that situation and treat people that way. Education and awareness are the key."
To find a food pantry near you, anywhere in Utah, visit utahfoodbank.org/find-a-pantry.
