Charlotte’s volunteer boom

Good morning! Today is Monday, November 24, 2025. You’re reading The Charlotte Ledger, an e-newsletter with local business-y news and insights for Charlotte, N.C.

Need to subscribe — or upgrade your Ledger e-newsletter subscription? Details here.

Today's Charlotte Ledger is sponsored by Carnegie Private Wealth. At Carnegie Private Wealth, we bring clarity to complexity. Through thoughtful planning and personal attention, we transform your financial aspirations into actionable strategies. Providing you with less stress and greater confidence in your future.

By Lindsey Banks

Volunteer groups have been hard to miss around Charlotte lately. Matching T-shirts, name tags and clusters of corporate teams are showing up across the city in bigger numbers as nonprofits report a noticeable rise in people lending a hand.

SHARE Charlotte, which connects volunteers with more than 600 local nonprofits, reports a 40% bump in participation compared with this time last year. It’s the busiest season they’ve had since April 2020, during the early months of the pandemic.

“When things get divided and scary things are happening, people come together, and I think they’re trying to find ways to support the nonprofit community,” said Melissa Hovey, executive director of SHARE Charlotte. She added that about 80% of traffic on SHARE’s website now comes from first-time volunteers, signaling a wave of newcomers.

The most in-demand volunteer opportunities on SHARE’s site over the past few weeks have been with Supportive Housing Communities, Champion House of Care Project One, Friends of Feral Felines, Hospitality House of Charlotte and Habitat for Humanity of the Charlotte Region. While Hovey said she hasn’t seen a noticeable jump on the site specifically tied to supporting immigrant communities, she has heard from groups like ourBridge for Kids and Charlotte Center for Legal Advocacy that they’re welcoming more volunteers than usual, in the wake of the U.S. Border Patrol’s recent operation in Charlotte. OurBridge alone had more than 1,000 volunteers last week, she said.

Other organizations are seeing similar momentum. Envision Charlotte, an environmental sustainability nonprofit, estimates that it has seen a 15% increase in volunteers, and The Bulb mobile market says 5,000 volunteer hours have already been logged so far this year, which is 1,000 hours over what it recorded for all of 2024.

The holidays always nudge people to give more than they typically might, but nonprofit leaders say this season’s spike has deeper roots.

With ongoing economic uncertainty and donors feeling more cautious, many are choosing to contribute time instead of money. And after the recent federal government shutdown interrupted or reduced some grant funding, nonprofits that address immediate needs, like food assistance, are seeing more residents wanting to help however they can.

“People are seeing others struggle more than maybe they have in the past, and this is what they can do to help solve it,” said Amy Aussieker, executive director of Envision Charlotte.

Corporate volunteerism is also booming as employers look for real-world ways to bring teams back together after years of remote work. Local companies such as Ally Financial and Wells Fargo are encouraging teams to get involved and are matching those hours with donations — in some cases, $25 per volunteer hour.

At Envision’s Innovation Barn, which is a sustainability hub often used for recycling projects, corporate groups sort plastics, weave donated T-shirts into reusable pads, tend to community garden plots and help process Paktech can carriers collected from breweries. Those carriers are cleaned, color-sorted and sold back to breweries for reuse at a discount — a small but efficient loop that depends heavily on volunteer hands.

Corporate groups are also embracing volunteer days as team-building time, and Aussieker said many stick around afterward to chat and unwind over a drink or snack. The combination of bodies and dollars has become a meaningful support stream, she said.

For smaller organizations, the influx of volunteers brings some logistical challenges. Many simply don’t have the staffing, space or structured projects needed to manage a large corporate group.

“That stretches the limits of a lot of nonprofits on taking care of that many people,” Aussieker said. Envision Charlotte is equipped to work with groups of 10 to 20 people.

The Bulb caps its volunteer shifts at eight to 10 people, but even with those limits, participation has soared. Volunteers spend hours picking up and sorting grocery-store produce before it’s distributed through 15 mobile fresh-market sites, which serve 65 to 100 households weekly. The Bulb is on track to distribute more than 400,000 pounds of food this year — a significant jump supported in large part by the increase in volunteer labor.

“Being able to tangibly feel the work and get that kind of perspective, I think, creates more humanity in the giving process,” said The Bulb’s executive director, Lisa Wendling. “It’s resonating more and more with the city.”

Even with the upswing in volunteerism, nonprofits need financial donations. The Ledger recently reported on a Bank of America survey that found that while total donations from affluent households have risen more than 30% since 2015, fewer wealthy Americans are donating at all. It’s making individual donations and volunteer engagement even more critical.

For food banks especially, cash can stretch further than donated items; nonprofits can buy wholesale and in bulk, often at prices consumers can’t match.

But, Hovey said, there’s no single “right” way to support local organizations — and there’s a growing sense that the community wants to show up.

“People can show up in lots of different ways,” Hovey said, “and we need to at this time.”

Lindsey Banks is assistant editor for The Charlotte Ledger: [email protected]

Today’s supporting sponsor is Dye Culik, a corporate and litigation law firm based in Charlotte, NC representing businesses and franchises in NC, SC, MA, and MI.

As we head into the busy holiday travel season, the outspoken CEO of United Airlines is throwing some shade at competitor American Airlines, Charlotte’s largest carrier.

On a podcast last week, United CEO Scott Kirby was asked what he thought the airline industry will look like in five or 10 years, and he replied: “There’s going to be two large, revenue-diverse, full-service brand-loyal airlines.” He later made clear he was talking about United and competitor Delta Air Lines, and the comment is a snub to American because the three are widely considered to be the big three legacy carriers.

He said there will be two big airlines in the future and that “everyone else is sort of competing for spill traffic,” referring to passengers who are unable to fly on their airlines of choice because the planes are full.

Kirby then added, in a clear reference to American: “They’ll still have places where they’re the dominant schedule. Charlotte, North Carolina, you know. American will have the dominant schedule there.” To a national audience, saying a competitor will dominate Charlotte comes across as faint praise.

While American is the world’s largest airline by the number of passengers carried, it has lagged behind United and Delta on most measures of financial success.

American accounts for about 90% of passengers at Charlotte’s airport and is the region’s fourth-largest employer with about 15,000 workers here, according to the Charlotte Business Journal’s Book of Lists.

American ‘cooked’? A well-known travel blog gave a headline to the CEO’s comments that said: “Kirby confidently declares that American is cooked.”

He has previously boasted that United will force American to remove Chicago as a hub. He made the recent comments on the Airlines Confidential Podcast.

Kirby was previously president of US Airways and then American, before leaving for United in 2016. —Tony Mecia

In an edition published Wednesday as its own standalone newsletter, paying Ledger members who have opted in to receive Real Estate Whispers in their inboxes enjoyed learning about the following topics:

Charlotte Commercial Real Estate Whispers is our regular check-in on Charlotte growth and development, available exclusively to Ledger paying members. It provides an inside look at what developers and other real estate pros are buzzing about — including plenty of scoops you won’t find elsewhere.

➡️ Receive Whispers as a newsletter by opting in online

Higher education is going through a big transformation — from rising costs and enrollment declines to new questions about the value of a degree. In uptown Charlotte, Johnson & Wales University is carving out its own path, one that tries to leverage affordability, career readiness and its unique strength in food, wellness and hospitality.

In a recent episode of The Charlotte Ledger Podcast, managing editor Ashley Fahey talks with Richard “Rick” Mathieu, president of Johnson & Wales’ Charlotte campus, about how the university is adapting to a shifting higher-ed landscape.

Mathieu talks about how JWU is trying to boost college access, the programs the university is expanding based on workforce needs and how the school’s culinary programs continue to shape Charlotte’s growing food scene.

You can listen to the full conversation at the link below, or anywhere else you get your podcasts.

Ledger members have just a couple of days left to suggest charities for us to highlight next week in a special edition. The deadline for our annual charity shout-out is Wednesday, Nov. 26. Details here:

(Recommending charities for our annual charity shout-out is yet another benefit of joining the community of Ledger subscribers. If you need to sign up to become a paid member, you can do that here.)

Events submitted by readers to The Ledger’s events board:

NOW THROUGH DECEMBER 31: “Learning Society Holiday Membership Drive,” Give yourself (or someone you love) the gift of learning this season. Queens University’s Mid-Year Learning Society Memberships are available at all tiers — and for a limited time, you can join for 50% off the regular price. Membership is offered at two levels and available as a single or dual membership. Also, the majority of your membership is tax deductible; you may choose to give the tax-deductible amount through a donor-advised fund. Individual Scholars Circle - $475. Individual President’s Circle - $1,250. Dual Scholars Circle - $950. Dual President’s Circle - $2,500.

DECEMBER 6: “Luz de Navidad,” 6-7:30 p.m., at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, 115 W. 7th St. Escape into the holiday season with a journey through time and cultures featuring Christmas music from Latin and South America spanning five centuries. This program brings new and ancient music to life with the voices of Nicholas Garza and Andrea Walker accompanied by an ensemble of period instruments. Our intimate, candlelit venue will set the mood for our concert and complimentary reception with the artists. Free parking with validation. $30/ticket.

DECEMBER 10: “Debut Author Lovell Holder Book Launch Event,” 6-8 p.m., at SouthPark Regional Library, 7015 Carnegie Blvd. For fans of “Survivor” and “Less,” Charlotte native Lovell Holder’s fast-paced debut novel shines an unflinching light on the drama of reality TV when a gay man returns to the cut-throat show he won in his youth after his adult life begins to unravel. $40 and includes a signed book.

➡️ List your event on the Ledger events board.

Need to sign up for this e-newsletter? We offer a free version, as well as paid memberships for full access to all 6 of our local newsletters:

The Charlotte Ledger is a locally owned media company that delivers smart and essential news. We strive for fairness and accuracy and will correct all known errors. The content reflects the independent editorial judgment of The Charlotte Ledger. Any advertising, paid marketing or sponsored content will be clearly labeled.

◼️ About The Ledger • Our Team • Website◼️ Newsletters • Podcast • Newcomer Guide • A Better You email series◼️ Subscribe • Sponsor • Events Board • Merch Store • Manage Your Account◼️ Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, X/Twitter, LinkedIn