Featured Non-Profit

FEATURED NON-PROFIT: WORLD CENTRAL KITCHEN

As part of our commitment to being a not-just-for-profit business, What’s Good selects a different charity each quarter and donates a portion of every order we receive. Our goal is to promote and support charities that are focused on environmentalism, however, it just seemed right to pick an organization that moves past geopolitics and danger to provide relief anywhere humans are suffering, whether it's a result of national disaster or political conflict.

Founded in 2010 by Chef José Andrés, World Central Kitchen (WCK) is a nonprofit organization that is first to the frontlines providing fresh meals in response to crises. 

When disaster strikes, WCK’s Relief Team mobilizes with the urgency of now to start cooking and serving meals to people in need. They achieve this by partnering with organizations on the ground, prioritizing purchasing local ingredients, and by activating a network of local restaurants, food trucks, and emergency kitchens. WCK serves meals to survivors of disasters, with the belief that good food provides not only nourishment, but also comfort and hope. Their motto is “Food is a Universal Human Right,” which is something everyone at What’s Good (and hopefully everyone everywhere!) can get behind. 

Read about WCK's response in the Middle East (October 2023) and a statement from CEO Erin Gore about how they are helping in Israel and Gaza.

World Central Kitchen was named Wall Street Journal’s Humanitarian Innovator of 2022. This is, in part, because WCK takes a multi-pronged approach to their mission; they are more than just a disaster relief charity providing meals to people in crises (which would be awesome enough). In addition to emergency food relief, WCK created: 

• Chef Corp – a global network of culinary leaders who are able to amplify WCK’s mission and accelerate their response — by connecting WCK to their own local contacts and resources when disaster strikes in their home regions, and by volunteering, raising awareness, and building community.

• Food Producer Network — A network (currently in the Caribbean and Central America, with plans to expand) that partners with and supports smallholder farms, fishers, and small food-related businesses with climate change mitigation and adaptation programs, to help build resiliency and strengthen food security in disaster prone regions.

• Climate Disaster Fund — WCK’s commitment to raise and spend $1B in the next 10 years to help communities impacted by disasters resulting from extreme weather events caused by the climate crisis. This includes immediate disaster relief as well as long-term scalable solutions, and WCK’s aim is to innovate and develop models that can be replicated across the world. 

• Clean Cooking — A program with the goal of improving the health (both human and environmental) of communities who still cook primarily with wood or charcoal, by empowering them to transition to cleaner, safer, and more ecological fuels. WCK builds and renovates school and community kitchens, converting them from using biomass fuels to LP gas, and installing water lines and sinks. WCK then hosts Kitchen Skills and Safety classes to ensure cooks have both the knowledge and the tools needed to make safe and nutritious meals.

What’s Good is proud to support World Central Kitchen this holiday season. We hope your What’s Good purchases make you feel good knowing that we’ll donate a portion of every order you place, supporting the WCK's good work in providing meals to people experiencing humanitarian crises and climate-related disasters. 

If you’d like to learn more about WCK, get involved, or donate directly, visit them here.

If you’re new to What’s Good, this is just one part of our giving program — we too like the multi-pronged approach. Among other donations, we  give 1% of our annual revenue to One Percent for the Planet. And, with every used box shipped (pick this option at checkout), we’ll plant one tree through One Tree Planted. 

Together we do more good. Thank you!