Social outreach groups team up to feed hungry kids
Rebel Reform (executive director – Loretta Kryshak) partnered with Just One More Ministry to help raise over $50,000 to feed malnourished kids in the Milwaukee area. With more than 60,000 kids (Milwaukee) who don’t know where their next meal is coming from, their unique relationship has proven a benefit to the community. It’s a relationship that blossomed during the pandemic.
Who is Just One More Ministry?
In 2008, Just One More Ministry had its humble beginnings when Chris Capper founded it as a food recovery program seeking to eliminate food waste and put food in the hands of people who needed it the most. Initially, Just One More Ministry, also known as JOMM, worked with a meal outreach ministry at St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church in Wauwatosa.
At its inception, food was “rescued” from suppliers in the greater Milwaukee area and repackaged and distributed to local churches and food pantries. Eventually, Just One More Ministry provided recovered food to over 90 Greater Milwaukee inner-city churches, food pantries, and organizations to help people struggling with homelessness and food insecurity. Today, Just One More Ministry caters to Milwaukee’s less fortunate by providing nutritious meals and food bags to the hungry. Just One More Ministry also provides a faith-based recovery program for those struggling with addiction.
Rebel Reform and Just One More Ministry
One of their major sponsors is Rebel Reform, the philanthropic arm of Rebel Converting. Together, they have provided resources such as a warehouse, facemasks and helped raise money to provide struggling families with meals. Their collaboration was elevated when Just One More Ministry needed a new warehouse in 2019.
Building a new Warehouse
In 2019, Just One More Ministry purchased a new warehouse to provide services to more individuals. Staff and volunteers worked hard to upgrade the facility, but resources were short.
Loretta Kryshak (with Rebel Reform) stepped in to help, sending in employees to fix insulation, freshen up the paint, epoxy the warehouse floors, install drywall, and more. Rebel Reform coordinated repairs by professionals one by one until the warehouse looked nearly brand new.
With the help of Rebel Reform, JOMM was able to revamp their new warehouse space, quadrupling the size of their old location. With additional space, Just One More Ministry was able to rescue even more food and distribute even more sustenance to the people of the greater Milwaukee area.
4 million facemasks
One of their biggest collaboration stories, Just One More Ministry and Rebel Converting, produced over 4 million volunteer-made face masks to help stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus in 2020. Early on in the global pandemic, Mike and Loretta Kryshak donated fabric of hospital-grade disinfectant wipes produced by their company, Rebel Converting, to make face masks.
An additional donation of fabric made another 2.5 million face masks. Partnering with Just One More Ministry, volunteers from over 1,000 households made more than 700,000 face masks. Partnering together, these two organizations met a local need and helped keep people safe.
In addition to their face masks, Rebel Reform donated over 30k to the organization in Sept 2020.
“What they’ve done is nothing short of miraculous,” said owners Mike Kryshak and Loretta Kryshak of Rebel Reform. “Everyone involved with Just One More Ministry has put their heart and soul into this initiative,” Mike added.
About Loretta Kryshak and Rebel Reform
Loretta Kryshak is the executive director of Rebel Reform, the social outreach division of the Kryshak family business. Rebel Converter is the family’s primary business and is a leading contract manufacturer of disinfectant cleaning wipes. Rebel Reform is a nonprofit organization that focuses its efforts on social causes and provides resources to improve people’s lives in the greater Milwaukee area.
Loretta has led Rebel Reform to various social initiatives like partnering with the 16th Street Community Center to distribute more than 4,000 bikes and helmets to children and helping package and deliver more than 1,300 backpacks for homeless individuals and families. Each backpack contained a pair of “happy socks” in honor of a well-known local YMCA employee who was tragically killed in a car crash.
During the global pandemic, Kryshak’s family created #MaskUPMKE to address community needs. With the Kryshaks’ help, 22 agencies and nonprofit organizations came together to make and distribute over four million facemasks.
Get Involved
If you would like to learn more about Just One More Ministry or Rebel Reform, please visit www.jomministry.org or call (414) 292-5112. Rebel Reform encourages Milwaukeeans to consider volunteering their time, talents, or resources to make Milwaukee a better place for all its citizens.
Rebel Reform hosts events such as the bike and helmet giveaway to the underprivileged, raising money for charitable organizations, and helping Milwaukeens with their community needs. If you are interested in getting involved, reach out on this site: https://rebelreform.org/contact-us-2/.
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