HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — The 2026 ABC13 Share Your Holidays Food Drive has kicked off a little earlier this season, with the help of local journalism students eager to tell the story of an event that’s now in its 46th year, benefits the Houston Food Bank, and focuses on giving back to our southeast Texas communities.
Want to pitch in? You can donate starting now by texting ‘SYH2026’ to 71777. You can also give online, or scan the QR code that appears on your screen during Eyewitness News newscasts.
Students from the journalism programs at Prairie View A&M University, Texas Southern University, and the University of Houston joined ABC13 as part of the station’s inaugural journalism lab to help announce the return of the event, which has become tradition in the Houston area.
The 2026 campaign, sponsored by Citgo, Greater Houston Honda Dealers, Houston Ballet, and Oak Farms, is all about fundraising and what the food bank calls foodraising.
Mark this date and time on your calendars! From 6 a.m. – 6 p.m. on Dec. 1, 2026, which is also Giving Tuesday, you can drop off food donations at sites throughout the Houston area, including at the Houston Food Bank, in the Montrose area, Baytown, Galveston, Sugar Land, Pearland, and Richmond/Rosenberg. All donations stay local.
What types of items can I donate?
According to the food bank, the most-needed food items are:
Shelf-stable snacks: Granola bars, crackers, trail mix, nuts, dried fruits
Canned goods (Low sodium, pull top preferred): Meats, fruits, vegetables, pastas, beans, soups
Drinks: Water, sports drinks, shelf-stable milk, shelf-stable juice (low sugar)
However, there are items that can’t be donated. That includes open packages, homemade food items, perishable foods, clothing, and tobacco. Click here to see the full list.
Does my monetary donation really make a difference?
Yes! Every $1 helps to provide 3 meals, so that can go a long way, the food bank says.
For example, a gift of $10 provides 30 meals for a hungry child, senior, or adult.
How much do the Houston Food Bank and the drive want to raise this year?
The sky is truly the limit. No donation is too big or too small, and again, it all helps our neighbors.
But we’re also not afraid to think big.
With the need only continuing to grow each year, ABC13 hopes to exceed our 2013 record of 1,627,115 meals during our Share Your Holidays drive.
What does food insecurity look like in Texas and throughout the Houston area?
At the state level, Feeding Texas reports that as of July 2026, 1 in 5 Texans faces food insecurity. That’s over 6 million Texans.
Feeding Texas, a member of Feeding America, is a statewide network of food banks and the largest hunger-relief network in the Lone Star State.
The organization also says that food insecurity is on the rise in the state with new data showing that in just one year, Texas saw food insecurity rise from 17.6% to 19.4%, and children and seniors saw significant increases in food insecurity during that time.
Feeding America adds that Texas has the largest food insecure population in the nation, and that Texas food banks are seeing record demand.
Additionally, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is projecting food prices to increase another 3% in the years ahead, Feeding America said.
A March 2026 report from Rice University’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research noted that 2 in 5 Houston households are living with food insecurity, meaning they lack access to sufficient, nutritious food.
The burden, Kinder says, falls hardest on communities already facing structural inequality, including Aldine, Greenspoint, Pasadena, and Spring.
A chart showing results from a Kinder survey of about 5,200 local residents shows that about 60% of households making less than $35,000 face moderate to high food insecurity.
About 40% of households with a household income of $35,000 to $74,999 face moderate to high food insecurity.
Around one million people in southeast Texas alone are food insecure.
An Aug. 18, 2025, report released by the Kinder Institute for Urban Research’s Center for Community and Public Health shows that household food insecurity is highest among Black (53%) and Hispanic (47%) residents.
Hispanic women endure the largest gender gap in household food insecurity, the Kinder Institute said.
Rural Texans also often face higher rates of food insecurity due to the unique challenges of living remotely such as lack of transportation, low wages, and underemployment.
Feeding Texas also reports that one in four Latinos are experiencing food insecurity. The overall food insecurity rate for Latinos in Texas is 24%.
How has ABC13’s Share Your Holidays helped before?
Thanks to Houstonians’ generosity, more than 1.1 million meals were created during the food drive in 2025, according to the food bank.
Viewers also helped the food bank beat its $75,000 fund drive goal, finishing at over $80,000 when the campaign ended on Dec. 31, 2025.
ABC13’s community partners at drop-off locations from Galveston to Katy and in between, reported an increase in the number of food donations they received as well.
Also, in 2025, organizers with the Ismaili Council said they collected over 100,000 pounds of food across their five Jamatkhana locations.
With the help of Houston Texans mascot Toro, our partners in Galveston said their site received $112,300 in sponsorship donations and collected 22,000 pounds in food.
Another site, VFW Hall Post 3903 in Rosenberg, said it collected about $4,800 in sponsorship donations and collected about 38,000 pounds of food.
The 2025 ABC13 Share Your Holidays Food Drive is back Dec. 2, 2025, Giving Tuesday, to raise money and collect donations for meals in southeast Texas.
How does donating to the Houston Food Bank make a difference?
The Houston Food Bank reports it provided 143 million meals in Fiscal Year 2025.
Eighteen million meals were provided to kids through the food bank’s Backpack Buddy, Kids Cafe, and School Market programs. Meanwhile, 14 million meals were made possible from HFB’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, application assistance.
View the full impact report here.
What to know about Share Your Holidays
What started as an idea to put a food drive on TV for an hour has morphed into a Houston-area wide event going strong more than 40 years later as the ABC13 Share Your Holidays Food Drive.
Since 1980, the year the drive launched at ABC13, millions upon millions of cans of food have been collected through Share Your Holidays.
Houston Oilers superstar Earl Campbell and teammate Tim Wilson were so moved by the occasion when it began, they arrived at the station with bags of groceries.
Both men spent the day with ABC13 personally thanking donors as they dropped off food, and what was supposed to last an hour turned into a daylong event.
That spirit of generosity in southeast Texas continues.
All donations stay in our local communities, helping the Houston Food Bank serve our neighbors in 18 counties through their 1,600 community partners.
Check out what being part of ABC13’s Share Your Holidays is all about. Watch the 2025 special in the video player above.
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