Food Bank For NYC earns 2026 USA TODAY Top Workplaces award
Food Bank For NYC's workplace award points to a bigger test: whether staff support helps keep 800 partner deliveries, 99.9% on-time service and citywide food access on track.
Food Bank For NYC’s latest workplace honor is really about the machinery behind its hunger response. The nonprofit said employee feedback helped it earn the 2026 USA TODAY Top Workplaces award, a recognition for organizations with 150 or more employees that have built people-first cultures.
The award, announced April 20, was based on Energage’s confidential Workplace Survey and reflected themes that employees raised around listening, engagement, support and empowerment. Energage said the assessment measures alignment, execution, connection and leadership, while USA TODAY and Energage said the 2026 program recognized 1,661 employers and invited more than 100,000 organizations to participate.
For Food Bank For NYC, the workplace message is tied directly to service. President and CEO Leslie Gordon said the organization’s people-first approach starts from within, and that staff who feel heard and supported are better equipped to serve neighbors with dignity and compassion. That matters at a nonprofit that says it is New York City’s largest hunger-relief organization, working across all five boroughs and nearly every ZIP code through about 800 community partners.
The scale behind that work is substantial. Food Bank For NYC said it distributed 103.5 million pounds of food in fiscal 2024 and delivered 86 million meals last year, including 31.4 million pounds of culturally relevant food. The organization also reports a 99.9% on-time delivery rate. Since Gordon became CEO in 2020, Food Bank For NYC says it has doubled food distribution to 150 million pounds, a sign that internal coordination and management structure are doing more than preserving morale. They are helping move food, faster and more reliably, to the pantries and kitchens that need it.
The nonprofit’s own fast facts put the stakes in sharper focus. Its food distribution program provides nearly 92 million free meals per year. Income-support services put nearly $87 million into the pockets of low-income New Yorkers last year, and nutrition education reached nearly 15,000 children and families. The city’s food insecurity rate stands at 15.0 percent, or nearly 1.3 million residents, while the average cost per meal in New York City is $4.86.
For A Simple Gesture, which depends on green-bag pickup schedules, volunteer pickup systems and partnerships with dozens of local food pantries in Guilford County, the lesson is straightforward. A people-first culture is not a soft extra. It is what keeps volunteer recruitment steady, pickup routes organized, partner communication clear and service dependable when demand rises.
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