LANSING, Mich. — If you like beer, you’ll like this. Breweries across Mid-Michigan are teaming up to fight hunger.
September is Hunger Action. “Hops Against Hunger” is just one of the Greater Lansing Food Bank's campaigns this month.
"It doesn't matter what's going on in the world, doesn't matter what's going on in the economy, doesn't matter what's going on if it's good or bad in people's lives, people enjoy drinking beer," said JR Miller, Director of Operations at Ellison Brewery and Spirits in East Lansing.
Michigan's notoriety for craft beer is exactly why the Greater Lansing Food Bank says they teamed up with local breweries to raise money for those in need.
"What we're doing is really simple. We're feeding people and that really hits home with a lot of people because you never know who is going to be facing hunger in your community," said Nalee Xiong with the food bank.
During the month of September, select bars across Mid-Michigan will band together to raise as much money as possible for the food bank in a campaign against hunger. Millers says he doesn’t want to put a cap on their funding goal.
"Sometimes in the beer community, there's this weird sense of loyalty, which means that you need to be against a different brewery. From our perspective, it's like 'man why not', let's do these things together. Let's reach out and support our community together,” said Miller. “I think that's what everybody else in our collective is doing.”
Breweries have full control over how they give. At Ellison, they're donating 50 cents for every pint of American Lager.
"We have buttons and so that's a really fun thing that we're giving to people just as one of the things if they purchase one the pints, they take one of these, wear these. Just to say, you're part of this with us we're doing this together,” said Miller.
Miller says a few hops really can make an impact.
"If it's with our friends at the different breweries in Lansing that are partnering with us, if it's changing somebody's life, if it's feeding a family that didn't know where their next meal is coming from, even moving people that come here as patrons to be more generous, more giving, more kind, or even with our staff," said Miller.
The Greater Lansing Food Banks estimates in Mid-Michigan alone there are about ninety thousand people facing hunger.
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