COLUMBUS, Ohio — Filling hundreds of trays of food.

What You Need To Know

  • The LunchBox Ohio is a nonprofit organization in Columbus, Ohio that gives away free meals to food insecure kids in the summer who can't rely on school lunch 

  • They specifically serve the Hilltop community and give away one hundred meals every Monday, Wednesday and Friday

  • The co-founders of The LunchBox Ohio are Katie Holmes and Elizabeth Spangler

The LunchBox Ohio is a nonprofit organization that helps feed children free hot meals three times a week during the summer months when they can’t rely on a school lunch.

“A lot of children in Columbus, Ohio, rely on school lunches as their only meal of the day. So in the summer, those services and the school lunches are not available to them,” said Co-founder and Executive Director for The LunchBox Ohio, Katie Holmes. 

Katie Holmes has had a passion for helping end childhood food insecurity for years. Thanks to north market restaurant Colo chef Justin Wotring, her dream of helping others has become a reality.

“Kids should never have to be food insecure or something like doing anything, especially if we have the means to do something that I’ve always wanted to do. And pairing with them is just meant a lot to me,” said the Chef for the LunchBox Ohio, Justin Wotring. 

Wotring is in charge of picking the meals that the LunchBox Ohio serves three times per week during the months that schools are on summer break. He says it’s about finding a healthy balance between nutritious and appealing to the eye of a child.

“We try to stay at the forefront of making sure they’re nutritious, but also making sure that kids are going to eat, because that’s an important part of it, too. So making it fun enough, approachable enough and tastes good, that’s kind of what we’re aiming to do,” said Wotring. 

The LunchBox Ohio specifically serves the Hilltop community in Columbus and delivers 100 meals every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Co-founder Elizabeth Spangler hand delivers the meals every week and says the community is always grateful.

Right now, the LunchBox Ohio only delivers food, but their long-term goal is to one day have a place in the hilltop neighborhood they can call home.

“A lot of the places around in that neighborhood are just convenience stores and there aren’t a lot of healthy options for kids. So we would love to have brick and mortar where not only volunteers can come and help us cook and package and prep a meal so we can still go out and serve them,” said Holmes. 

The Lunchbox Ohio is making sure no child goes hungry during the summer.