Great Barrington — Resident Dennis Iodice started work at the nonprofit The People’s Pantry as its director of operations in mid-March.
According to his LinkedIn resume, Iodice was previously the managing director of Berkshire Dry Goods.
Iodice joins organization President Beth Moser and Shannon Maneely-Ranson, who started work as the manager of administration for the organization back in September.
The organization opened in 1999 and has operated out of Saint James Place, at 5 Taconic Avenue, since 2017. It is open twice a week and distributes a variety of fresh food and hygiene items to residents and families in need. “I chose to work for People’s Pantry because food access, along with local food and community, are all very big things for me,” Iodice told The Berkshire Edge. “Working for The People’s Pantry checks off all of those boxes. The People’s Pantry tries to get as much product locally as much as we can by working with the farms in the area. We are as local as we possibly can get. This organization is also kind of a convergence of what everyone else is doing because we all can affect change.”
Iodice cited many differences between working for a nonprofit entity and working for a for-profit company. “If you are working at a for-profit company, you’re always going to go after that bottom line,” Iodice said. “Here at The People’s Pantry, the bottom line is feeding people, which is the most important thing. We’re not beholden to certain standards that you would be working for a corporate company.”
“My training is in accounting, and I think I knew even before graduating [from college] that I always wanted to go the nonprofit path,” Maneely-Ranson said.
According to her LinkedIn profile, Maneely-Ranson graduated from Merrimack College in North Andover with a bachelor’s degree in accounting in 1997.
“I wanted to do something meaningful, which is why I put my skills behind nonprofit social service and mission-driven organizations,” Maneely-Ranson said. “It personally makes me feel like I’m achieving two things at once, which is moving forward both professionally and with personal satisfaction at the same time by helping out others.”
Moser started with the organization as a volunteer nine years ago. “Over the past few years, we have seen the need for food grow dramatically in the area,” Moser said. “We thought a few years ago that the need would be temporary due to the pandemic. But it wasn’t, and you can say it might have to do with inflation.”
According to Moser, the organization has served twice as many people in January and February 2024 compared to that same timeframe in 2022. “In two years, the numbers have doubled in the amount of people we have coming to The People’s Pantry,” Moser said. “We don’t see any reason to think that the growth of the number of those in need is ever going to stop. It’s hard to keep up with feeding people. But it’s a great thing to know that more people know about us and people are not shy to step forward in asking us for help. It’s what we are here for.”
Moser said that the organization currently serves 250 families, with each family consisting of at least three people. “The hard part right now for our organization is that to feed more people; it costs a lot to do that,” Moser said. “We provide high-quality food, and it’s sad to say that high-nutrition food is much more expensive than zero-nutrition food.”
Iodice added that, while the organization could use more donations, it could also use more volunteers. “Today, both I and another volunteer unloaded two pallets of food, which was about 2,400 altogether,” Iodice cited as an example. “There should not be any embarrassment when it comes to people asking for help,” Moser added. “There’s no reason for people to be living on ramen noodles when they can get fresh produce and quality proteins. Our mission is to provide healthy, nutritious food locally sourced as much as possible.”
For more information about The People’s Pantry, visit its website.
