Non profit organizations and other groups make use of wholesale food resources on a regular basis. Many of these groups are dependent on donations to keep running and using these types of companies helps them to make the best use of their money. Some non profit organizations may be small, local ones that have a need to feed people in the area but have limited access to resources.
These distributors can help them maximize their assets to help provide nutritious food to those they serve.

There are many charities that provide food in some form to people in their communities. Some of these groups are in large metropolitan areas and serve hundreds of meals on a daily basis. These may be homeless people, those displaced during weather events or special groups of people like single parent families. Many of these groups provide food as the main resource but others provide food as a part of the total package they provide to their clients.

Charities are not the only groups that use wholesale food distributors. Many small communities across the nation have limited resources for providing child nutrition services for area schools. In many areas of the country, hunger is always an issue due to social and economic conditions. These services provide a variety of options such as prepackaged meals, nutritious snacks or single servings of food that can be used to feed people in need. Some communities also use these resources to obtain food for senior citizens or prisoners.

These bulk food providers work with a variety of different food manufacturers and obtain a wide variety of different types of foods. They follow strict guidelines in regard to food labeling information and freshness. Unlike many of the groups that rely on harvested foods that are left over from markets or farmers, this type of food comes straight from the company that made it. They obtain product overruns from manufacturers in many cases. These come from errors in production when too many of one item is made. They also use relationships with the manufacturers to obtain large amounts of different products at one time. This reduces overall cost greatly.

These providers can sometimes ship products straight from the manufacturer to the client. This may help to reduce shipping costs. Other times, the food comes from a warehouse facility owned by the provider. This may be the case for prepackaged meals in which the components come from many different sources. Wholesale food suppliers have a variety of ways of packaging food for clients.