Kanbe's Markets
Delivering food justice one neighborhood at a time.
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Programs and results
What we aim to solve
In 2018 the National Bureau of Economic Research published a study titled "The Geography of Poverty and Nutrition: Food Deserts and Food Choices Across the United States," affirming that “food deserts” are disproportionately found in disadvantaged neighborhoods, and also challenged the notion that attracting large urban grocery stores is the only solution to this issue. Kanbe’s Markets is working to sustainably expand healthy food access to every Kansas City metro neighborhood defined by the USDA as “low-income and low-access.” The Healthy Corner Stores program partners with small corner stores, bodegas, gas stations and convenience stores to help them sell healthy food. Kanbe's is delivering donated and wholesale-priced fresh produce in underserved communities at prices and quantities otherwise unavailable to them. In this way we reduce food waste while sourcing fresh fruit and vegetables our partners can sell at affordable prices.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Healthy Corner Stores
The Healthy Corner Store (HCS) is the flagship program of Kanbe's Markets. The business model is designed to support small, locally-owned store owners in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods facilitate the sale of healthy and affordable produce (fruits and vegetables). The HCS program provides a refrigerated cooler and stackable basket rack that receive a full stock of fresh fruits and vegetables 5 days a week. The food is sold. on consignment, eliminating any risk for the store owner of handling perishables. Past-prime food gets replaced with fresh food at no cost to them, and routed to either food pantries or farms depending on quality. 30% percent of all sales are shared with the store owner, contributing back into the fabric of the community. This program is designed to have large, up-front costs, but over time, with scale, becomes self-sustaining (even with variable costs).
Redirection
Kanbe's rescues over a million pounds of produce annually from large, wholesalers and hand sorts it to ensure that good produce makes it to hungry people. Over half of what we rescue ultimate goes to feeding people. The top 7% is high enough quality to be circulated into our retail operations for primary sale. The next 50% of what we rescue is "imperfect" and can be cooked with. This produce is shared with Donation Partners, food pantries and kitchens, to be given away or turned into meals, the same day it is rescued and for free. The third tier, roughly 20%, is unsuitable for humans but nutritious and enriching for animals, and goes to farms. The forth tier is separated from any plastics or packaging and sent to compost.
Food as Medicine
With FQHC, Kanbe's Markets has embarked on a "Food as Medicine" program, where individuals who screen for food insecurity and chronic disease by their health care provider can access vouchers to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables weekly. Food prescriptions are only as good as the ability of a patient to access the recommended diet. With 75 locations, Kanbe's Markets makes access to fruits and vegetables possible in many communities that lack conventional grocery stores.
Where we work
Awards
Proud to Pay a Living Wage 2023
City of Kansas City
Affiliations & memberships
Pays a Living Wage 2023
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Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
It is the goal of the Kanbe's Markets organization to eliminate food insecurity for all citizens in Kansas City. Our food delivery system fills the gap left by the grocery industry of needing to buy large quantities of food, food that easily expires. This model leaves out the small retail businesses and prevents them from offering fresh, healthy produce in their stores.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
Kanbe's Markets delivers fresh produce daily to these small businesses and places the food on consignment, eliminating the risk of the small business owner. A percentage of the sales is shared with the business owner, creating incentive to add Kanbe's coolers to their floor plan. Kanbe's Markets is the hub for a network of fresh, available food getting into the hands of those who need it the most. We serve as a resource for wholesalers and recapture food they consider waste, eliminating hundreds of thousands of pounds of food going into our landfills. Because we deliver daily, we can lengthen the life of any particular produce, which would be tossed by wholesalers before it has gone bad, simply because of the food delivery system.We work with local growers to help them distribute their entire harvest, not just what they can sell to restaurants and at farmer's markets. Buying from them at discounted prices ensures that none of their food goes to waste. Putting this nutrient-rich food into our community had great nutritional benefits to our customers.Even we have waste and sorting our food every week gives us the opportunity to remove all of the plastic clam shells and cardboard cases and taking them to a recycling center, eliminating more plastics going into the landfill. The food that's past its prime gets delivered to our local grower partners to be used as compost in their fields, creating nutrient-rich soil.This is a program that works for our community. Scaling our efforts to reach more neighborhoods will reap even more and more benefits for the citizens of Kansas City.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Maxfield Kaniger is the founder and executive director of Kanbe's Market. He has worked in and around food since he was 12 years old. Mr. Kaniger’s family has owned and operated restaurants his entire life. Previously, he has have worked in physically demanding industries such as oil and gas, and construction.
In 2011, he took a year off of college and turned a failing company with less than $5,000 per month in revenue to a thriving company of close to $200,000 a month in revenue without having to bring in any new investment. Mr. Kaniger spent the last six years learning everything he could about food insecurity. In 2017, Mr. Kaniger handled all of the day to day activities to run Kanbe’s Market. The organization has grown from 4 locations to nearly 20 and distributed around 230,000 pounds of fresh produce in 2018, and almost all of it has been recaptured.
Keith Mulloy joined Kanbe’s Markets as program director in February of 2019 after working in the retail industry for ten years. Born and raised in Kansas City he attended Rockhurst High School, Pittsburg State University, and UMKC. Keith is excited to help improve the city that he loves by giving everyone the opportunity to access healthy food at an affordable price.
Keith has stepped in as the true "boots on the ground", making sure that each of our partner stores has everything they need, seven days a week, to make fresh healthy food a reality in their community. This includes working with farmers and wholesalers to source the best quality food at affordable prices, composting our waste with those same farmers, making sure all of the pricing and merchandising in stores are up to date, that our truck and refrigeration stays in good working order, and, most importantly, that we are staying in communication with the community to stock what food makes the biggest impact for them.
We have worked hard to assure our donors that our food delivery model works for all. This is the year we begin to really scale the model, grow the program, and offer more services to the underserved communities in which we are working to eliminate food deserts.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
We are serving 28 stores on the East side of Troost in Kansas City. By the middle of 2020, we want to be in 50 stores and continuing to expand our services to those in need.
Due to the COVID-19 virus, Kanbe's Markets has been called to serve in ways not in our strategic plan. It is our desire to provide fresh, healthy food to those in need and during the pandemic, the need has increased tremendously. We're able to take on more donated produce because of the size of our refrigerated warehouse. We are also able to distribute to churches, community centers, schools and pop-up kitchens, as many organizations work to provide meals to families and individuals in need.
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
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How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals
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Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive, We share the feedback we received with the people we serve, We tell the people who gave us feedback how we acted on their feedback, We ask the people who gave us feedback how well they think we responded
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What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
It is difficult to get the people we serve to respond to requests for feedback, We don’t have the right technology to collect and aggregate feedback efficiently
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
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Kanbe's Markets
Board of directorsas of 11/02/2024
Jen Malone
BMG Advisors
Term: 2024 - 2026
Stephen Hoag
PwC
Darlene Thompson
ReDiscover
Patrice Wright
Lee A. Tolbert Community Academy
Davin Gordon
Hall Family Foundation
Nancy Kenner
Kenner Law Firm
Wedndell Cole
Blue Cross Blue Shield
Danny Ritz
Striem
Christal Watson
KCK School Foundation for Excellence
Andrew Hsu
Spotlight
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Transgender Identity
Sexual orientation
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Disability
No data
Equity strategies
Last updated: 11/02/2024GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.
- We help senior leadership understand how to be inclusive leaders with learning approaches that emphasize reflection, iteration, and adaptability.
- We engage everyone, from the board to staff levels of the organization, in race equity work and ensure that individuals understand their roles in creating culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.