Dear Friend,

On Sunday, September 22, close to 1,000 people will gather at Riehle Plaza for the annual Hunger Hike. For over 27 years, Lafayette Urban Ministry, Food Finders Food Bank, Inc. and the Haiti Ministry at St. Thomas Aquinas Center have worked together to organize this community event to raise awareness and funds for food programs.

Your business now has the opportunity to be a Hunger Hike event sponsor, join the fight against hunger, and be a part of helping children and families with food insecurities in our community and in Haiti. Your sponsorship will help us reach our goal and will be used as follows:

• Lafayette Urban Ministry will use this money to support its many food and nutrition programs for at-risk children and working families, including the new LUM Protein Food Pantry, meals for the homeless, snacks & meals for children in summer camp and after school & summer childcare programs, and special dietary needs of the elderly and sick.
• Food Finders Food Bank, Inc. will use the money to enhance the programs offered in their Mobile Food Pantry, Back Pack Program and Food Resource & Education Center — an important initiative to educate clients in self-sufficiency as a means to reduce their food insecurity.
• Haiti Ministry at St. Thomas Aquinas Center will use these funds to expand the nursing outreach program, assist in establishing a community store, and further develop the hybrid seed & food storage programs to increase crop yields.

We hope that THIS is the year that you will consider being a partner with Hunger Hike. Below you will find the levels of sponsorship. We encourage you to choose a level that will give you the recognition you deserve. Together we can make important strides to reduce hunger and give hope to the least among us.

Sincerely,

If you’re interested in becoming a 2019 Hunger Hike event sponsor, please call or email us (765-423-2691 | hungerhike@lumserve.org). Please respond ASAP so we may include your business in promotional materials like the posters & T-shirts.

Hunger Hike – Event Sponsorship Levels

Hunger Hike DIAMOND – $5,000 minimum; which includes:

• At Hunger Hike events: Sponsor name & logo on T-shirts; opportunity to have promotional materials displayed; Sponsor name announced; Sponsor name displayed
• Hunger Hike website: Sponsor logo with link to company website
• Sponsor thanked on all social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), newsletters & bulletins of St. Thomas Aquinas, Food Finders Food Bank & LUM (reach: 15,000+)
• Ad in St. Thomas Aquinas bulletin for two months
• 4 – Hunger Hike T-shirts
• Plaque – recognition of sponsorship; Letter of recognition for sponsorship
• Sponsor name listed in the Food Finders Food Bank annual report

Hunger Hike GOLD – $2,000 (up to $4,999); which includes:

• At Hunger Hike events: Sponsor name & logo on T-shirts; opportunity to have promotional materials displayed; Sponsor name announced; Sponsor name displayed
• Hunger Hike website: Sponsor logo with link to company website
• Sponsor thanked on all social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), newsletters & bulletins of St. Thomas Aquinas, Food Finders Food Bank & LUM (reach: 15,000+)
• Sponsor name listed in the Food Finders Food Bank annual report

Hunger Hike SILVER – $1,000 (up to $1,999); which includes:

• At Hunger Hike events: Sponsor name on T-shirts; opportunity to have promotional materials displayed; Sponsor name announced; Sponsor name displayed
• Hunger Hike website: Sponsor name with link to company website
• Sponsor thanked on all social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), newsletters & bulletins of St. Thomas Aquinas, Food Finders Food Bank & LUM
• Sponsor name listed in the Food Finders Food Bank annual report

Hunger Hike BRONZE – $500 (up to $999); which includes:

• At Hunger Hike events: Sponsor name on T-Shirts, announced and displayed
• Hunger Hike website & Facebook event page: Sponsor name
• Sponsor name listed in the Food Finders Food Bank annual report

Hunger Hike FRIEND – $300 (up to $499); which includes:

• Hunger Hike website: Sponsor name

If you’re interested in becoming a 2019 Hunger Hike event sponsor, please call or email us (765-423-2691 | hungerhike@lumserve.org). Please respond ASAP so we may include your business in promotional materials like the posters & T-shirts.

Dear Friend,

On Sunday, September 22, we will be joining with hundreds of participants in the annual Greater Lafayette Hunger Hike at Riehle Plaza in downtown Lafayette, and we need your help to make our efforts matter!

Here in Central Indiana, surrounded by the most productive farmland on the planet, in the wealthiest nation on earth, food insecurity remains a baffling reality for far too many of our neighbors. A full 70% of the students enrolled in Lafayette School Corporation participate in the federal free and reduced school lunch program.

They are children whose parents constantly worry about whether food at home will run out before they get enough money to buy more. They live in households where there isn’t always enough to afford well-balanced, nutritional meals.

Altogether, about 14 percent of U.S. households – roughly 48 million people or one in seven Americans – go hungry at some point during the year. This number actually underestimates the problem because the survey excludes the homeless and transients, groups that almost by definition lack enough food.

Yet despite the widespread and complex nature of the problem, the solution to food insecurity in our community is surprisingly basic: we must respond by providing food to children and adults who don’t have enough to eat.

One of the most important ways to do this is through your continued support of Hunger Hike.

Hunger Hike is a 3K fundraising walk along the beautiful Wabash Heritage Trail in Lafayette. It takes place on Sunday, September 22. Our goal this year is to raise $100,000 for the hunger relief efforts of Lafayette Urban Ministry, Food Finders Food Bank, Inc. and Haiti Ministry at St. Thomas Aquinas Center. I hope you will come out and hike with us this year. You can find out how by visiting hungerhike.org. I also hope that you will make a generous gift to Hunger Hike, right now, prior to the event.

Your gift of $50, $100, $250, $500, $1,000 or more, will allow our three, hunger-fighting partners to better fulfill their missions of feeding hungry children and strengthening families who are experiencing food insecurity.

• At Lafayette Urban Ministry, your gift will allow the new LUM Protein Food Pantry to provide healthful meat, fruit, vegetable and dairy products to 2,100 families who will come for help during the next year. It will cover the cost of infant formula and baby food. It will help to provide the paper products that SNAP assistance won’t. It will also help to pay for 20,000 meals to the homeless and 35,000 nutritious snacks to low-income children that LUM provides each day.
• At Food Finders Food Bank, Inc., your gift will allow for the expansion of the classes and programs offered in their Mobile Food Pantry and Food Resource & Education Center – an important initiative to educate clients in self-sufficiency as a means to reduce their food insecurity.
• At St. Thomas Aquinas, your gift will reach beyond our community to allow the Haiti Ministry to expand the nursing outreach program, assist in establishing a community store, and further develop the hybrid seed & food storage programs to increase crop yields.

Hunger Hike is our community’s oldest and most well-respected fundraising walk, dating back to the early 1970’s. Last year more than 1,000 people participated in the event. Over the years, more than $2 million dollars has been raised, providing a critical social safety net to thousands of hungry children and adults. Your past support of Hunger Hike has allowed us to wage an aggressive fight against hunger in both our own community, the region and in Haiti.

We hope you will join us again this year by walking a little farther – and digging a little deeper. Please, won’t you make a generous gift to Hunger Hike today?
Make your check payable to “Hunger Hike” and place it in the enclosed envelope – or give online at hungerhike.org/donate.

Gratefully,