The Palmerton Food Pantry has become even more user-friendly thanks to the creation of its own website.

Joe Murphy, director of the pantry, said the website, palmertonpantry.org was launched last month.

“Simply, the idea originated from the lack of an existing site,” he said. “We have a vital service which is needed by so many families that we should be easy to find, and easy to get information on how to receive assistance.”

Murphy added, “the website is a necessity for so many reasons,” the most urgent of which is click bait directory services.

“When I began looking for places to volunteer, many searches resulted in sites that give you info about anyone who is willing to pay them for ranking and had nothing to do with my specific search in my specific area,” he said. “I’ve heard that sentiment echoed back to me by many people as a reason they stopping looking.

“Even sites that tell you where to receive help often lack any real information about the services or worse, wrong information. For our area, we are changing that now.”

Despite the website’s relative newness, Murphy said “for our basic search terms, we are already ranking at the top of most search engines, including Google, and we haven’t begun working on our SEO yet.”

Additionally, Murphy said they have created a website for the Christian Action Council of Palmerton Area Churches (CACPAC), and was finalizing the content for all the member churches, which he said should “be up and running in the near term.”

Murphy believes there are benefits for the pantry to have a website.

“So many benefits; it’s hard to choose the primary as whatever someone is needing from the site is the primary reason of the moment,” he said. “Summed up; accurate information of how to receive help, where to receive help, who can receive help and when to receive help.”