Photo by Monica Lim
Melba Willis, owner of New Carrie’s Corner Market in the north St. Louis neighborhood of O’Fallon Park, opens a box of whole-grain cereal for her son, who reaches for the small plastic toy hidden inside. In other neighborhoods, other corner stores are doing the same: offering healthier choices.
New Carrie’s Corner Market is one of several small retail stores that participated in the St. Louis Healthy Corner Store Project, a three-year program sponsored by University of Missouri Extension and the City of St. Louis Health Department. Though the program concluded last year, its effects are still seen in stores and pantries, which have increased shelf space dedicated to healthy foods like whole grains, organic produce, beans, and bottled water. The best part: Neighborhood stores are able to offer healthy options without breaking the bank.
Now, other stores are following the Healthy Corner Store Project's model. The St. Louis program has expanded to become Stock Healthy, Shop Healthy, a statewide program in which neighborhood associations and local health agencies nominate local grocers to receive resources that help them sell healthier foods. The program just completed its second year and will expand its reach in the coming months.
Program director Kara Lubischer did not expect national attention when the program began here. Now, she makes trips to rural Missouri, Kansas, and Nebraska. “I’m still waiting for a call from Hawaii,” she says with a laugh.
From the outset, she wanted to create a model that other stores could replicate. While not every community can support a large grocery store, corner stores can provide fruits and vegetables alongside the typical stock of packaged chips and snacks. The program doesn’t seek to eliminate junk food, but rather to expand available choices.
“We are not going to change things all at once," Lubischer says. "There are so many different diets in the U.S., and it is very difficult to change consumption behavior. But the goal of the program is to work with the community to build demand for healthy foods.”
By many accounts, it’s working.
At New Carrie’s Corner Market, Willis doesn't keep bananas by the register for fear of running out too quickly. She recalls the excitement when the program began: “We had large amounts of greens like turnip and kale and vouchers for all the produce outside. We started with large amounts and then cut down, so that we sell everything now. We also had food tests, so people will know what to cook. Eating healthy, especially for the kids, really comes down to the families and what they choose to cook and eat.”
For Naser Hamed, son of Regal Meat Market owner Aziz Hamed, adapting to the community is key. “Oven-baked chips didn’t do so well," he recalls. "You have to experiment a bit.” Today, a basket of potatoes and apples greet customers at the market, located in the Walnut Park East neighborhood.
These shops are “more than just a store,” says Lubischer. Both New Carrie’s and Regal Meat Market have in business for more than two decades and listen closely to customers. “Some people will ask me, ‘You got oranges?’ We tell them yes, and sometimes they’ll be surprised. Or they’ll ask and we’ll try to bring that item in,” says Hamed. A poster at the back of the store is filled with requests and phone numbers.
“Aziz at one point tried to sell watermelon, but found that they weren’t selling,” says Lubischer. “He realized that most of the customers are seniors and can’t carry a whole watermelon home, so he began serving smaller slices in cups. When the suggestion board went up, one of the items said, ‘Cut watermelon,’ and it was circled and had stars around it.” Suddenly, the watermelon began selling.
Approaches for best practices can be found in the retailer toolkit the University of Missouri Extension wrote with the help of Washington Avenue Post's Bob Ray and his mother, Karen Carty. The toolkit suggests simple changes—for instance, real fruit juice instead of high-fructose corn syrup—that can encourage customers to make healthy choices.
When the store opened 13 years ago, as Washington Avenue was beginning to see a resurgence, the owners didn't necessarily plan to offer healthy food. Today, though, it sells local bread and meat, whole grains, and organic and non-GMO packaged meals.
"What’s beautiful is that customers don’t complain or don’t notice," says Carty. "And all of a sudden, you have healthy choices in your store.”
Photo by Monica Lim
Ray and Carty are sensitive to the types of communities that these stores serve, and they’re passionate about small markets. “There’s a web of connectivity for all these small stores,” says Ray. Because many small stores can't buy in bulk from distributors, it may be more difficult for these retailers to buy in quantities that work for customers. Carty suggests small stores team up by joining a co-op, which could provide large amounts of produce that could in turn be sold at the corner stores, some of which are located in food deserts. “This program—what we do—is a small element of a bigger problem,” says Ray.
Reflecting on her own experiences, while looking at children's colorful drawings of fruit that hang on a wall in New Carrie’s Corner Market, Willis says, “I think this program has helped me to be a better mother.”
