Free Fridges Provide Community Support

By Rikki McGinty

2020 Rikki McGinty

On a recent Friday afternoon, Greene Hill Assistant Manager Matt Clemons surveyed the store’s produce and sorted out the following: 10 pounds of bananas; four honeydew melons; 15 Valencia oranges; four pears; three pints of cherries; one watermelon; three bunches of collard greens; four pounds of limes; three pounds of ginger; and several bunches of cilantro, rosemary and dill.

“They all had a couple of good days left before turning,” Clemons said.

Although the items were rung up as spoilage, rather than being designated for composting, they comprised that week’s donation to a community fridge just a few blocks from the Co-op.

Walk up Bedford Avenue and cast a glance to your left on Quincy and you will be greeted by an orange refrigerator with a big smile. Painted by graffiti artist Morgan Smith (Instagram: @themorganl_), the fridge invites you to “take what you need and leave what you don’t” and offers a variety of free, healthy foods donated by a range of organizations, businesses and individuals.

The “Queen of Quincy,” as it is known, is hosted by The Playground Coffee Shop, which provides the outlet and pays for electricity as well as keeping the fridge organized and clean. The Queen of Quincy is one of a fast-expanding network of community fridges that has sprung up in Brooklyn and beyond in 2020.

2020 The Friendly Fridge

The backbone of this loose network is Brooklyn-based A New World In Our Hearts (Instagram: @iohnyc), a pioneer in the free food movement that has been co-hosting a food-sharing event in Bed-Stuy’s Herbert Von King Park every Saturday since 2009. The first community fridge was initially meant to temporarily house leftovers one Saturday in February 2020, but IOHNYC volunteer Thadeaus Umpster decided to adopt it as a permanent community resource at 133 Van Buren St. Within four months, IOHNYC was running 16 community fridges – all without accepting money donations.

“We wanted to show you could do this without money,” Umpster said, “just based on what people could give.”

Volunteers took on the responsibilities of communicating with donors and transporting — in their cars or trucks or on their bicycles — the donations to the individual fridges. At any point, people can find milk donated by St. John’s Bread of Life pantry, greens from the aquaponics farm Universe City, produce, meat cuts, and cheese from Greene Hill, vegan meals-to-go cooked by Bed-Stuy residents, as well as tubs of hummus and homemade salsa.

Dumpster divers or food rescuers play a role as well: Several cases of expired Vitamin Water were spotted on the sidewalk outside a gym preparing for reopening after the COVID shutdown; the haul was promptly reported to IOHNYC and distributed among network fridges.

While COVID-19 was not the spark that launched community fridges in the United States, the sudden urgent need for food propelled their expansion not just in Brooklyn or New York City, but across the U.S. and beyond national borders. Freedge.org, which offers maps and spreadsheets for locating current community fridges, recently coined this phenomenon “the @iohnyc effect.”

Umpster is quick to point out, however, that A New World in Our Hearts is only a partner to the many local entities that host, maintain, and stock the community fridges. More and more often, he receives calls from eager individuals or shops who want to start a fridge. To gain startup support from IOHNYC, however, they must first show they have the relationships with donors needed to maintain the fridge long-term. For that reason, the consistent support and donations that the Co-op provides is crucial to the success of the community fridges in our neighborhood.