The Mayor of Auckland wore our t-shirt

In July, Mayor Wayne Brown started 100 Days of Startups. For 100 days he wears a different Auckland startup's t-shirt and tells that company's story on his social channels. HelpingHand was picked as one of the hundred, so we sent him a navy t-shirt carrying our line: Choice, not a box.

This week the video went out. Here is what he said:

"Food banks. These guys don't have all the clever inventory, software and hardware that the big companies have. Helping Hand is a management system for food banks and this will help reduce waste, be more efficient, and allow for choice so that people don't just get a box of random food. Well done Helping Hand, that'll do."

You can also watch it on the Mayor's Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram.

What he got right

Foodbanks don't have supermarket systems. As the Mayor put it in his caption, a lot of these places are run by volunteers and depend on grants to keep going. A supermarket has systems tracking every shelf. Most foodbanks are doing it by hand.

Choice matters. A standard parcel works on paper. In practice, it hands a family food they may not eat, and the waste ends up somewhere. When people choose the items they need, rather than standard items they're given, less goes in the bin.

What HelpingHand does

HelpingHand is software for foodbanks, food pantries and social supermarkets. It was built in Milford, on Auckland's North Shore, alongside the people who run them.

• Stock in and out. Scan donations as they arrive and parcels as they leave, so you know what is on the shelf.
• People choose their own food. Households pick what they need from what is in stock, instead of getting a standard box.
• Your rules, not ours. Referrals and limits on items are optional. A foodbank is not a shop trying to sell as much as it can, so it can set how much of something each household takes.

Good Works Trust on the North Shore runs on it today. Sophie, who leads the foodbank there, helped shape it from the start.

If you run a foodbank

If you're managing stock with a spreadsheet and a lot of goodwill, we would love to show you how it works. Have a look at helpinghand.nz, or book thirty minutes and we'll walk you through it with your own operation in mind.

And thank you to Mayor Wayne Brown and the team in his office for the shout-out. It means a lot to the foodbanks we work with to hear it from him.