Supporting the Community

With people firmly at the core, Montague has taken a vow to support Australians in need.

National

Montague is a family-owned business that is passionate about fruit and natural, wholesome produce practices. People are the core of the business, both family, our team members and all of the suppliers we work with.

Our passion is to bring natural, healthy fresh produce to everyone at an affordable price.

As part of our commitment to supporting others, we have worked with highly regarded social impact organisations for many years.

Montague is proud to work and donate to Foodbank Victoria and Foodbank Australia including the annual Hunger Ride event held in March each year. Montague also supports SecondBite, to aid underprivileged Australians facing hunger.

We recognise our fresh produce donations and support is a small step however we will continue to invest resources into these valuable organisations, to which many people rely upon for food.

Foodbank

As Australia’s largest food rescue organisation, Foodbank provides an astonishing 77 million meals a year to more than 2,600 charities and 1,750 schools across the country. Each year, they distribute more than 38 million kilograms of food, the equivalent of over 189,000 meals a day.

Montague are proud to be regular supports donators to Foodbank Victoria and Foodbank Australia. In the 2020/2021 financial year, Montague supported Foodbank Victoria by donating 68,291kg of fresh produce. This is the equivalent of 124,182 meals to families across the state. Across the whole of Australia, Montague donated 143,300kg of fruit through Foodbank Australia.

On top of regular donations to Foodbank, Montague also assist with the sponsorship of programs and events in partnership with Foodbank.

Foodbank Victoria School Breakfast program

Foodbank Victoria in conjunction with the Victorian Government, roll out a school breakfast program to over 1000 primary and Secondary schools throughout Victoria.  Fruit for this program must be grown and packed in Victoria by Victorian growers, Montague being one of the main suppliers of this program, helping to supply the apples (mainly JAZZ™, envy™ and Pink Lady®) and Packham pears for this program.

Hunger Ride

2019

In March 2019, Montague’s JAZZ™ Apple was the major sponsor of The Hunger Ride, Foodbank’s 1-day corporate cycling challenge in North East Victoria.

“Montague has been a long-time supporter of Foodbank’s work and The Hunger Ride presents a great opportunity to extend that support,” says our Managing Director Ray Montague.

“Millions of Aussie apple lovers have embraced the great taste of JAZZ™, including through Foodbank’s work in the community and in schools, and we’ll make sure all the teams taking part in The Hunger Ride can re-energise with a JAZZ™ Apple and be at their best for what I’ve heard is a pretty gruelling ride!”

2020

The 2020 Hunger Ride event was sponsored and supported by our CROC EGGS™ Australian Plums brand, which helped raised over $130,000 for children and families struggling to put meals on the table.

 

2022

The 2022 Hunger Ride event was an exclusive corporate cycling challenge through 174kms of Victoria’s most beautiful and difficult cycling terrain across Mount Buffalo to Bright. The ride was led by Hunger Ride Ambassadors, cycling champion Baden Cooke and cycling broadcaster Matt Keenan, along with Tour de France winner, Cadel Evans, with every kilometre helping to raise much-needed funds to provide vulnerable children and their families with emergency food relief. The event raised over $150,000 (equivalent to more than 280,000 meals), which is the most amount of money raised ever for the Hunger Ride event!

“To everyone at Montague, thank you for your support of the Hunger Ride yet again – it’s been our most successful one ever, with more than 280,000 meals going out to Victorians in need. JAZZ™ apples – what an amazing product. Every rider got to enjoy them, at every break, and they loved them.” Dave McNamara CEO Foodbank Victoria

Recovery Ride

2021

In April 2021, Montague’s JAZZ™ Apple was the major sponsor of The Recovery Ride.

The Recovery Ride is a family-friendly mass participation cycling event along the East Gippsland Rail Trail that took place on 17 April 2021. This event attracted attendees from across the state to visit the small bushfire affected town of Bruthen and discover all that East Gippsland has to offer, and also assisting with the long-term recovery of the communities affected by the 2020 Black Summer Bushfires.

SecondBite

Founded in 2005, SecondBite exists to combat the increasing level of national hunger. Through the redistribution of nutritious surplus food to under-privileged communities, the organisation has embarked on a plight to end food insecurity in Australia. They supply over 1,400 community food programs with food, supporting people who are homeless, woman and families in crisis, youth at risk, indigenous communities, long-term unemployed, people with disabilities, asylum seekers and new arrivals.

This financial year, SecondBite has redistributed 24.3 million kilograms of surplus food across the country, equating to over an astounding 64,000,000 meals.
Montague has supported SecondBite with donations of fruit totalling 3,199,011 kilograms.

McGrath Foundation

The McGrath Foundation is a breast cancer support and education charity, which raises money to place McGrath Breast Care Nurses in communities across Australia and increase breast health awareness. In Australia, one in seven women will be diagnosed with breast cancer by the age of 85.

Since being founded in 2005, they have raised more than $28 million through their initiatives which has supported over 95,000 families affected by breast cancer by providing invaluable physical, psychological and emotional support, from the time of diagnosis and throughout treatment.

In 2021, Montague ran a supporting campaign with the McGrath Foundation for three weeks, with 10 cents from every kilogram sold of JAZZ™ Apples being donated to the organisation.

Regional and local

Montague has community at the heart of everything that we do. At a local and regional level, Montague supports connected communities and areas where our growers and employees reside.

Each year, we provide sponsorships to local football and netball teams in Batlow, Swan Hill, Allansford and Berwick, to assist those in the area and surrounds in need.

 

One Foot Forward- Black Dog Institute

Throughout October 2021, a small team from Montague signed up to One Foot Forward, a walk for Mental Health, and raised a combine total of $1713.00 and walked 303kms. The funds raised will help Black Dog Institute put ground-breaking new mental health tools that work into the hands of people who need them.

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