American Notes CHARITY

USE YOUR CHANGE TO MAKE A CHANGE, urge check-out-counter signs at 32 Cincinnati-area Kroger supermarkets. When customers fork over a $20 bill to pay a $19.24 charge, they can donate the difference to the grocery's fund to provide fresh food for the hungry.

"In most food programs you wind up with canned goods," says Kroger Vice President Jack Partridge. After studying food banks, Kroger found that poor people's diets often lack fresh fruit, milk, bread and potatoes. The customer donations defray Kroger's cost of issuing food stamps for twelve such selected perishables to needy recipients. Since it was launched in March, the program has dispensed about $5,000 a week in food.