Greater Vancouver Food Bank

The registration staff, NiTasha, is extremely inaccurate and lacks knowledge. The way she talks to clients resembles interrogation, hurting the feelings of people with her tone of voice and manner of speaking. She needs training, as her way of speaking is causing distress.

Volunteering for distribution is always a wonderful time with great staff, other volunteers and feels so good giving back.
The staff makes every person who is in need feel welcomed, heard and valued

Incredible organization helping people in need. The volunteers are always kind and friendly.

I'm finally back again for another great round of the GVFB charity organization!

So much has changed since I've been back on the team again. Quite impressed with the new way of scheduling for volunteer shifts as the app provides a more efficient way to access new opportunities.

Also, I was excited to find out that finally my request for weekend shifts is a new addition to schedule including other new distribution locations so at least now I can help out on some weekday shifts after 4pm and weekends too!

Feels so good to be surrounded by so many good hearted people who are dedicated to help with a helpful spirit.

One person I met recently that really stole my heart was a lovely woman named Penny
whom I worked side by side with and I'm so highly impressed with her dedication, hardwork, quick response, and genuine positive spirit!

Penny also rides her bicycle to this location and the hills are so steep going up and down. I hope she gets recognized by the supervisors for her dedication and superb attitude! I'm thankful to meet an incredible inspirational woman.
Thank you GVFD soooo much for the feel good experience with all the lovely people I get to surround myself with and to all the food sponsors and donors as well for a community that needs a helping hand of support as it gives me faith in a beautiful province that I adore so much!

2 years ago
Great place to volunteer your time in helping others. Everyone is so friendly helpful and caring. I'm really thankful for such a wonderful experience with like minded people who are part of sharing and helping a great cause to the community.

I can't imagine someone that really needs this service.what a terrible experience. To start no parking.how someone that provide a food service doest have parking for people who pick up the food.horrible
They cannot keep going like these.the big companies who support this organization with money and Donations.they need to audit this.it is not working for the people that are supposed to help. I know a person who was in their " black list " because she was there two minutes before the opening time. (they refused to give her food for a whole month) HORRIBLE

Definitely someone needs to fired their CEO or general manager.it is not working.maybe is working for the companies getting a brake with the donations for next year taxes but not for the people in need.

We should be ashamed that we tread our new Canadians and our own people like second class citizens

With the rising costs of living, the Greater Vancouver Food Bank has been recently seeing more people in need of food support. A $1 donation can purchase more than $2 worth of food.

I am so thankful for GVFB on what they do and been a solution for people who are living on pay cheque on pay cheque that their help on food survival weekly is so helpful and amazing! I do have to say Thank You for the lovely staffs/volunteers and all the vendors who supplies the foods for us daily/weekly for the food bank. I am so grateful and so much appreciate for the help. I try to go when i can or when i am feeling well after being paralyzed and my walking is not good or its long period of standing, which causes me to loose it balances. I do try to stretch out my food from the foodbank as much as i can. So far it coming along. I try to go when i can also i know due to the poverty and so many others needs help the line up is enormous i might have to skip some of the weeks due to health issues its day condition, follow that letting others to have their turns on getting on what they need for themselves for their families. I just wish there would be more of the GVFB others could offer a helping hand other solutions! Due to the poverty the inflations due to the War everything uprising cost in living on pay cheque to pay cheque and annually rent increase (capping at certain %) is not going to stop the rent increase annually. So its grateful for the GVFB of their services. I will never forget the GVFB on what they have done. Thank You GVFB!

I was planning to make an online donation but noticed that if I pay by credit card, the GV Food Bank mentioned that their credit card processing cost is 6.3%. I’ve been in small business and the highest cc processing charge was 3.9% and I operate on 2.9% - the high cost of 6.3% baffles me and I’m withholding my donation until this issue is explained to the public here. Thanks!

Added 8/19/2022:
Now I understand but then I’ll suggest that Interac eTransfer should be added as a more modern way for people to donate to the Food Bank that is cost-free to the Food Bank. Once this is set up (very easy), I’ll resume my twice yearly donations. Thanks!

Thank you for providing help and it’s much appreciated. But it’s been more than few times that the foods’ expiry date I grabbed were right after a day or sometimes a week before. Dairies are sensitive and in case someone use them without checking the expiry date it might end up in food poisoning.
I attached a photo of the milk I’ve been given on august 5 which is expired a week ago
Thank you

Why is everything from the food bank expired. It seems everything you get is two weeks expired bread milk (milk expired 8 days ago) doesn't matter.how can you give your children two week expired milk. I'm sorry but if the stores want to dispose of their two week old expired food please put them in the trash not the food bank. Why do you let the people dispose of your garbage. Just a write-off for the big stores nothing for the people. You go here you get maybe a day's worth of food that's it. I have been unlucky enough to go to the food bank for the last year and this is the least amount of food I've ever gotten from a location. Look at the photos they show so much food they have a huge Warehouse full but they give one can of salmon and expired milk, expired everything nothing to live off. As for the staff very friendly and helpful.

I like the whole food idea. Would be great if more organic solutions, for health reasons, but I'm grateful for what there is. It's good to be able to go weekly.

Polite, respectful, kind, compassionate.trans friendly
Special thanks to the staff and all those amazing volunteers

This is not a good place to volunteer.

I did commit my volunteer work 3 years ago and I did it for 5 months. After several years later, I contacted the staff for asking reference letter. They made an excuse to refuse to write me a letter and they are unable to make any exemption due to their new volunteer hour policy. I finally understand I made the wrong decision to use my time to volunteer for this bad organization.

I will never use my spare time to volunteer here in the near future.

Awesome place for those of us in need, friendly atmosphere and very happy and kind individuals that volunteer here. 5+ stars

I suddenly thought that I wanted to donate, so I donated to the Food Bank once. However, since my financial situation has been bad since then, I asked Food Bank not to send emails or emails related to donations. However, they keep sending me e-mails, and I'm under a lot of stress from it. I really want to donate only when i want.

Working at this place provides an insight on how hard everyone works to deliver the best they can for the people.

Amazing people working on their team! They make sure you truly feel respected as a person. Their staff are there every week, rain or shine, to make sure people who need that little bit of support have food for the week.

I went to drop off food, the gentleman dealing with vehicles was a great help and it was so easy to drop in an outside bin there and staff available to take it all inside immediately. Sad to see the huge lineup for food. Please bring a few cases of food bags of toilet paper and treats for kids to the Food Bank.

Great place to volunteer your time in helping others. Everyone is so friendly helpful and caring. I'm really thankful for such a wonderful experience with like minded people who are part of sharing and helping a great cause to the community.

Awe there the best I can't make it on time n showed up an he after cause of the snow n they made me two bags for me and they are all amazing I'm so thankful and thank you for your help

Had to drop Noodles skids to that center. They were very lovely staffing. Good place to donate.
Pran foods
WestEast

Excellent work and superb fantastic dedicated people. They deserve full.community and business support.

The Food Bank - Now this is the place one goes for emergency food givin to 1 who has no funds to go to a normal store like Save On Foods or Superstore.the food bank gives 1 a bit of food that has been donated by people or companies donate items like tons of bags of tortilla chips but no salsa for ur chips.uve got to thankful for getting anything for the food bank.everyone there is so kind hearted as if ur new that they will help u any type of food that they have like potatoes or beans or maybe a good box of chocolate granola bars.they will try to help u every way that they can.the volunteers there are so kind! U can never get a better safe feeling that food has nothing to do with paying a bill & u don't have to give up the food in order to pay a bill.so relax there are food banks in Vancouver, Burnaby, & finally Surrey BC.good luck if u need a place to go to & be thankful for these volunteers are handing u 3 bags of nacho chips & milk beans or eggs & potatoes they will always give u a tiny bit extra for example the person a head of u doesn't take all ttheir potties, & they say y can have it.once yr done at the food bank then take the time to say thank u for the volunteers for their time they are using to help feed u & ur family.with kids or a other partner in yr family.together.so if u physically got NO food in ur cupboards then make it the right day & go & line up & get what ur given. & don't forget to say thank u.

Pemeten.hope this is helpful.
Take care.remember Vancouver Burnaby & Surrey BC CANADA.

As a volunteer, I can assure everyone that the Greater Vancouver Food Bank DOES NOT keep the good food for themselves, nor do they give out expired food!

Please ignore those bad reviews from ignorant people. The conscientious and hard working volunteers and paid employees deserve our respect.

About the expired food claims. I think this comes from a general lack of knowledge or knowing the difference between “expired” and “best before”. The food bank has strict guidelines about destroying expired goods (I know about that b/c I have volunteered on the dumping line and experienced a minor eye injury from splash-back of various contents being dumped into a bin). Any highly perishable goods have an expiry date and they are destroyed. Best before, shelf stable, products are allowed to be distributed up to (about) four months after manufacturer date. This is sound and very conservative save practice because they are only suggested dates.

In my opinion, the food bank is too strict about dates, and too much potentially good food is wasted.

The Greater Vancouver Food Bank is a great place to volunteer or work.
They have a huge operation going on supporting so many individuals and families. They collect food donations and make sure right people receive them before they go bad.
Best would be if they got more cash donations as then they could use it more judiciously and got right food for the families with food problems.
In short a definite place to volunteer!

It is a privilege to be a part of an organization that helps people look after each other by providing nourishing, sustaining food. It is very well run, has a caring attitude to the hundreds of volunteers that help out, and genuinely tries to honour and respect the people who drop in weekly to the hubs in various neighbourhoods to obtain food. If you donate food, you can be sure that it will get to the people who need it. If you donate money, they can triple its buying power and distribute fresh fruit, vegetables and healthy meals. If you donate time, you will know that your efforts are appreciated and well-spent.