Moody Nolan, DNO Produce and Orange Barrel Media Serve Columbus Community By Sharing Goods and Expertise
These local businesses are serving the community by doing what they do best.
Authentic corporate philanthropy can be more than writing a check. Here’s a look at three Columbus-based businesses that are serving the community by sharing their resources, time and expertise—and, in the process, creating new opportunities and partnerships.
DNO Produce: Keeping the food ecosystem in motion
When schools and restaurants started closing in March 2020, DNO Produce saw longstanding clients cancel truckloads of fruits and vegetables overnight.
“Our business basically fell off a cliff,” says Jeremy Taylor, vice president of sales and marketing for DNO Produce Inc., a distributor and processor for food service, food manufacturing, school service and other partners across the Midwest. “But we knew there were going to be a lot of hungry people. We had the storage, the trucks, the people to get this food where it needed to go. It was just a mindset shift.”
During 2020, DNO Produce participated in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farmers to Families program, which assists farmers in rerouting produce to federally funded food programs, including regional food banks, churches and community organizations. The company assisted in the donation of nearly 168,000 boxes and 1.68 million pounds of produce, Taylor says.
“We were shipping around two or three truckloads a day of fresh fruits and vegetables for six months,” Taylor says. “We got to employ people back when many were laying people off and buy from farmers and growers who had no place to go with their product.”
Taylor says that DNO Produce’s mission is to solve problems with fruits and vegetables, and it’s a cause ingrained in the company’s 200 employees.
“What’s a better thing to get behind than fresh fruits and vegetables? We try to find people who are romantics about fresh produce,” Taylor says. “That is what’s going to separate us as a business, but also keep us around for a long time.”
Orange Barrel Media: Empowering communities through art
Orange Barrel Media enacted a highly visible form of activism in 2020—spreading art-driven messages of community, protest and wellness across animated billboards in 20 U.S. cities. Known for its dazzling, building-spanning advertisements, the Columbus-based media company decided to pour resources and opportunities into local communities at a time when business was uncertain for many.
“Our community engagement has consistently proven the social and economic value of partnerships in communities we serve,” says Corey Favor, director of community engagement and strategic partnerships for Orange Barrel Media.
In Columbus, Orange Barrel featured seven local artists and their artistic activism, with messages focused on voting and racial justice.
“We wanted to show our social awareness, our commitment to communities and uplift the messaging that was important during that time,” Favor says. “I’m really proud of the work that we do to create those moments for artists to engage in that capacity.”
Across interactive kiosks and digital signage, the company also ran public service announcements with information about voting rights, COVID-19 and mental health awareness.
In addition, Orange Barrel worked with small, local businesses to display advertisements for free. At a time when local restaurants and service-driven businesses were heavily affected by the pandemic, Favor says showing a true commitment to local entities was essential. In total, Orange Barrel donated nearly $5.5 million in advertising space to local artists, businesses and public service initiatives in the first months of the pandemic.
“Our CEO, Pete Scantland, is a community-driven entrepreneur, so he always wants to make sure that we’re able to help smaller businesses where we can,” says Favor. “It’s about being authentic, and we’ve never shied away from doing what’s right.”
Moody Nolan: Creating a legacy, one home at a time
During conversations about the impact of their architecture firm’s philanthropic efforts, father-and-son Curtis Moody, founder and chairman of Columbus-based Moody Nolan, and Jonathan Moody, CEO, discovered they wanted to do more than just donate dollars to causes they believed in.
Related:Jonathan Moody on his "both-feet-in" moment with his architecture firm
The result of those conversations was the Legacy House, a 750-square-foot home located in the Linden community. Moody Nolan designed and built the house in 2019 and gave it away, mortgage-free, to a family in need. Jonathan says that the home was crafted to be useful and beautiful, much like the larger architectural projects that Moody Nolan is known for.
“We wanted real rooms—real bedrooms, bathrooms and a kitchen. But can we think about it in a way to make the most out of it? We knew it had to be a smaller home, but we didn’t want to compromise functionality,” Jonathan says.
Developing the affordable, single-family home with community partners was a challenge in creativity and problem-solving.
“If we can get all these people together, we can do this for one family. I do think there’s power in the ripple, or as my dad says, the drop in the ocean. That allows people to realize, if we all can do a little bit, that really does add up to a lot,” Jonathan says.
After the Linden project, Moody Nolan expanded the Legacy House effort with a goal to build a house to give away in each of the 12 cities where its offices are located.
“There are so many resources. You realize that everybody can’t give away a house, but there’s so many people who have so much that can contribute. That adds up to a lot,” Jonathan says.
This story is from the 2022 issue of Giving, a supplement of Columbus Monthly and Columbus CEO.