Hunter Guthrie can trace his passion for food recovery back to elementary school when he noticed the large amount of unused milk that students discarded sitting in unrefrigerated collection bins. Struck by the fact that this perfectly good dairy would be wasted, he got permission from his parents to pick it up and bring it to a local shelter. Now in high school, Hunter runs a nonprofit that has rescued nearly 700,000 meals from local businesses to bring to food assistance organizations.

Hunter was recently selected as a finalist for Cox Enterprise’s Cox Conserves Heroes initiative, which recognizes youth and adult volunteers making a positive impact on the environment. As the finalist who received the most votes, he was able to select a nonprofit to receive a $30,000 contribution—and he chose ReFED.

We recently caught up with Hunter to learn more about him and his story.

The following interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

You started your food rescue journey in elementary school. Tell us a little bit more about how you ended up running a food recovery nonprofit.

It started with recovering milk in elementary school, but then COVID hit, and I was out of school and lost touch with recovering food in school. Three and a half years later, when I was in eighth grade, I saw a flyer at the library from a local shelter asking for food. That day, I started baking items to donate.

But the way I was baking food…muffins, cookies, things like that…it wasn’t healthy, and it wasn’t efficient enough to service the growing needs of the shelter. When the shelter started a no turn-away policy, so that everyone who showed up could get food, it meant smaller portions. This was my push to start working at a bigger scale and I started asking local restaurants in the area if they had food to donate.

A lot [of restaurants] didn’t answer or said no, but I knew I could only grow with their help since restaurants throw out a lot. I kept trying and trying, thinking that maybe one would get back to me. And finally, someone did.

I’m curious about the types of food businesses that you work with. How much food do you typically rescue each month? Are you trying to work with more businesses?

Right now, I’m working with three main restaurants—Chick-fil-A, Panera, and Crumbl Cookies—and I’m also working with a local farm that donates apples and other produce items. The shelter's biggest need is produce, so the relationship with the farm is helpful.

We typically rescue around 20,000 meals each month, and we’re definitely trying to work with more businesses. Now that we’ve gotten some recognition, I’m hopeful more restaurants will finally get back to me! My newest attempts are to contact Greek and Mexican restaurants, diners, and local grocery stores.

What keeps you motivated to keep rescuing food?

It’s a great question—I’d say being able to look at the impact that I’m having in my community is a big one. In addition to my personal work, I have solicited the help of hundreds of teenagers who support the shelter with other requests beyond food recovery, including making meals which is something the shelter has specifically requested. I even have a couple of friends from my swim team asking if they can go talk to restaurants in their towns about food recovery.

One of the teenagers who I recruited to make lunches for the shelter shared a story with me about her uncle. He was trying to get sober and was getting food from the shelter, which proved to be a lifeline for getting back on his feet. She told me that when she donated the lunches back to the shelter, she really felt connected to the people there.

Another time, I saw several teens playing basketball behind the shelter, and I asked them if they wanted some cinnamon rolls from Panera. We spent a few minutes talking as they ate, and we were able to really connect—all over these cinnamon rolls. Those are the interactions that keep me going.

How did you hear about ReFED? Why did you choose our organization as the beneficiary for the Cox Conserves Heroes competition?

When I was told that I was one of three finalists for the Cox Conserves Heroes competition, I was asked to pick a charity that would receive money. Each finalist’s charity would receive some amount of money, but it was the finalist with the most votes that would receive the top amount of $30,000.

Since I run my own food recovery nonprofit, I considered giving the money to it…but then I realized that if I found a nonprofit which worked on eliminating food waste on a larger scale, that would be better. That’s because my work is just in my area, and the country and the need are much bigger than that.

While doing some research to find a deserving nonprofit, I came across ReFED and thought it looked great. I did some more digging on Google, and saw that it had been quoted in a few recent articles and then I found the website. I was very impressed with what I saw, and I knew then that ReFED was going to be my selected charity.

What are your future plans for your food rescue nonprofit? Do you want to work on food waste as a career?

In the short term, I’m going to keep working on eliminating food waste and keep putting out notices in my community for other teenagers to join and help my food recovery work. Longer term, I’m hoping to keep rescuing food while in college.

As far as a future career, I’m not sure what I want to go into. That’s something for “future me” to work on. That said, I think I want to focus on conservation and helping the environment in some way. In fact, recently, I presented my research at the District of Columbia’s 2024 Clean Energy Summit on how DC’s residents can use more energy efficient water heaters. When I was finished, they offered me an internship for the summer of 2025.