“Spread The Joy II, Peanut Butter for the Pantries”

KROS Radio is once again spearheading a campaign to help area food banks.  “Spread the Joy II, Peanut Butter For The Food Pantries,” will be held December 10 – 14 and  is designed to help stock area food banks with peanut butter, a commodity that is, for the 2^nd year in a row, hard to come by. Food banks around the area say high peanut butter prices have made it harder for them to provide one of their most-requested items and a favorite among children. Peanut butter prices remain high and local food pantries have not received peanut butter shipments since last spring.  If they want peanut butter they have to go out and buy it themselves or go without.  Peanut butter is popular at food banks because it’s a kid friendly source of protein that has a long shelf life and doesn’t require special storage or cooking. 

“I got the idea last year after listening to a Chicago radio station,” says KROS staff member, Greg Naftzger.  “KROS is always looking for ways we can help in the community and the peanut butter drive seemed a little different and sounded like a fun project.  We had such a tremendous response last year with hundreds and hundreds of jars of peanut butter collected.  This October the Clinton Food Pantry contacted us to see if we were going to do another Peanut Butter drive as they had no peanut butter in stock.  The Fulton Food Pantry has not received any peanut butter from their distributors since April and has had to go purchase their own peanut butter to distribute.”