Diapers and wipes are expenses that neither SNAP nor WIC benefits can pay for.  Faith is a young mother with two children who is served by a food pantry.  She lives in a safe apartment with an average utility bill of $200 a month.  She works full time at a job that pays her more than minimum wage and earns $16,640 a year. She also receives SNAP (food stamps) and WIC benefits, which don’t cover all of her food expenses so she’s very thankful for the food boxes from the pantry.  After paying her rent and utilities, Faith only has $250 a month left to pay for her car insurance, fuel, non-food household items and baby essentials.  She tries to only buy diapers when she really needs them.  She walks to the Dollar General to get some exercise and save wear and tear on her car – it’s about half a mile from her apartment.  Each package of diapers at the DG doesn’t cost too much, but there just don’t seem to be enough diapers in the bundle, and she’s back at DG once again.  Buying her diapers and wipes at DG is convenient and doesn’t cost her gas dollars, but it costs her more cash dollars.  For each child, she’s going to pay $981.34 extra – $1962.68 total – compared to a parent who can afford the bigger box of exactly the same product at Sam’s Club or WalMart.  That extra amount is 12% of her salary: the total cost of diapers and wipes at DG is 18.9% of her salary, for two long years.  When our diaper bank partners with her food pantry, she gets diapers and wipes with her monthly food box.  And we make sure it is the biggest package possible!