(CHERRY HILL, NJ) -- When entrepreneurs Dan Goldberg and Nick Ballias opened Foodiehall, a pickup and delivery-only virtual food hall and E-restaurant in Cherry Hill, NJ, they did so with the mission to donate as many meals as possible to those in need. With seven concepts in-house to start, and another three to follow once they hit their stride, Goldberg and Ballias, along with Culinary Director Georgeann Leaming, knew that they’d be able to make a real difference in delivering food to programs on the front line of hunger in the U.S.
But what they’ve been able to do in their first few months in business has been nothing short of amazing. The startup is on pace to donate 50,000 meals this year, having already donated 7,200 meals for March and April through their Meal 4 Meal program, with no signs of slowing down on the horizon.
For every single meal ordered at Foodiehall, the business donates a meal to Feeding America, which supports food banks nationwide.
“We created the Meal 4 Meal concept because too many of our neighbors do not have adequate nutritional food to eat,” said Ballias. “We want to be part of the solution to help others, and this program is a vitally important element to our mission to support the community where we live and work. We knew when we opened that we’d be feeding people every day, but we couldn’t have imagined that we’d already be hitting the numbers we are hitting.”
Feeding America is the largest hunger-relief organization in the United States, with 200 food banks and 60,000 food pantries and meal programs going strong. It serves 40 million people, including 12 million children and seven million seniors throughout the country.
“When you support Feeding America, you help their nationwide networks including school-based food pantries, emergency disaster relief, and more,” said Goldberg. “We are so thrilled with the community’s response to our concept, as they’ve fully bought into our mission. It not only allows us to be personally successful, but it also gives us the opportunity to employ more people and feed more and more people every day. The better we do, less people go hungry, and that means everything to us.”
Foodiehall opened in the final days of February with five dining concepts operating daily. Since then, they’ve added two, and are excited to roll out their next several restaurants in the coming months, according to Goldberg. By expanding the number of food brands being offered, the Foodiehall owners expect substantial sales growth. They are also in discussions with several national brands to join Foodiehall, which should help their meal donation numbers increase exponentially in the second half of 2022.
