While the economic struggles in Elkhart County are far from over, new sources of support for those in need continue to sprout up.

One Goshen company decided to think outside the box to offer help; actually, outside the building.

Berry Plastics owns a 7 acre piece of land right next to its Goshen factory; the land had been vacant and overgrown with weeds for years.

But that changed with one employee's bright idea that will end up helping hundreds of area families.

The empty lot in the middle of an industrial park had been a nuisance.

“We’ve been mowing the weeds down and then one night, the light bulb went off and came up with the idea,” said Dave Riggs, the Berry Plastics employee who thought of the idea to grow corn on the land.

So, they contacted a local farmer.

“He said, ‘are you guys nuts?’” said Carol Marquart with Berry Plastics.

But not because it was hard to grow…

“With 7 acres, it’s just a lot of corn and he thought how can we get rid of that much corn? We're finding it's not going to be a problem,” Marquart said.

See, this isn't a side project to rake in some extra cash. It's not business at all.

“It’s incredible for a company to take the initiative and do that that's what we need in the United States,” said Ray Randolph with the Justice Store House.

All the corn harvested will be donated to area food pantries.

“It’s awesome. I can't even tell you fresh produce is like candy to people that have gone without it for a while,” said Pam Bingaman with the Middlebury Food Pantry.

It doesn't get much fresher; the pantries started picking up their ears an hour after the harvest started.

“Most of them said they'd take all the corn they could get their hands on,” Riggs said.

Because the need is still staggering.

“It’ll break your heart I mean if you see a lot of people in need anytime you can find resources, it's incredibly needed,” Randolph said.

And this new form of support all started with one person seeing the potential in a vacant field.

“So let's do something with it! You know, people thinking like that is what's going to get us through,” Bingaman said.

“If somebody does a little bit, it makes a big difference when you add it all together,” Randolph said.

Meantime, Berry Plastics says Kercher's Sunrise Orchard really made this all possible by donating their time and resources to plant and harvest the corn; and T and T Fertilizer also helped with the process.

They say it really was a team effort.

They estimate they harvested around 100,000 ears of corn off the 7 acres.

Most of them were spoken for even before Friday, and they say fortunately the corn can also be taken off the cob and frozen to last into the winter months.