Contributed photo
Sam Mick stands beside the Animal Rescue League of Marshalltown sign. Mick has donated 140 pounds of food to the animal shelter each month since 2017.

Animal shelters throughout the country rely on donations to get by. The Animal Rescue League of Marshalltown is no different.

In 2017, Marshalltown resident Sam Mick saw a Facebook post from the Animal Rescue League asking community members to donate food for the animals staying there.

He thought that he could set up a monthly autoshipment of food and donate a few times rather than just bringing in food once and never doing it again.

Mick decided to use the popular pet supply website chewy.com to send the donations. The website features an autoship option where customers can choose products and delivery dates. He initially thought that it would just be a one-time donation or that he would continue the shipments for a few months. However after realizing how much of a need for food the shelter had, Mick knew he had to keep going.

In 2019 alone, he donated 1,868.1 pounds of food.

“After visiting and seeing how many animals were there, I knew how much food they had to go through so I decided to just keep it going,” he said.

Mick has donated more than 4,000 pounds of food to the shelter. The shipments include cat and dog food and change each month depending on what the shelter has the highest need for at that time.

Though the idea came after a seeing the social media post, Mick’s true interest came from seeing how much his own dogs eat. He knew that a shelter with as many animals as Animal Rescue League must struggle keeping up with the need.

“I already had set up an account for my dogs, so it seemed like a simple and easy idea to help out,” he said.