Great Plains Food Bank expands Fargo hub to meet rising demand

Great Plains Food Bank broke ground May 13 on a new statewide distribution center in Fargo, a project built around one blunt fact: the current hub, in use since 2000, has run out of room to keep up with demand.

The new facility at 3315 Westrac Drive is planned at 70,500 square feet and is expected to expand warehouse capacity by 57 percent. Great Plains says the building will add pallet storage, cooler and freezer space, and additional loading docks, the kind of capacity that determines whether food moves quickly or sits in trailers and off-site storage. For a network that spans rural North Dakota and Clay County, Minnesota, that difference can mean fewer bottlenecks at the dock, less wasted handling time, and more reliable deliveries when volunteer routes and pantry schedules tighten under peak demand.

The food bank said the old Fargo site has forced it to rely on costly rented storage and temporary trailers, a patchwork that gets harder to manage as volume rises. In 2025, Great Plains served 167,163 people, an 11 percent increase from the year before, and distributed more than 14.8 million pounds of food. Its annual report said one in five adults in the region turned to the food bank and its network for support, while Kitchen Coalition provided 64,500 prepared meals. Wellness pantries grew to 34 sites and school pantries to 42 locations.

That scale is why the new hub matters beyond Fargo. Great Plains says the facility will support nearly 200 partner agencies, pantries, shelters and meal programs, and its broader network is described as 205 food pantries, shelters, meal sites and other charitable feeding programs in 104 communities. CEO Ann Prifrel said the new building will let the organization serve more people, in more communities, more frequently and more efficiently.

The project is being financed through the Harvesting Hope Campaign, a $30.5 million capital effort tied to the food bank’s infrastructure needs. In 2025, Gov. Kelly Armstrong signed House Bill 1143, providing a one-time $5 million state appropriation through the North Dakota Department of Agriculture, with private donations set to match that money dollar for dollar. Starion Bank contributed $250,000 and Chevron invested $150,000 to help equip the building.

Great Plains, North Dakota’s only food bank, has operated for 43 years and says it has distributed more than 256 million meals since 1983. The Fargo expansion is its answer to a familiar nonprofit problem: when demand rises, mission alone does not move pallets. Space, docks and storage do.