YES! We Want a Grocery Store

By PJ Martin

Editor

The Herald-New

 

People began showing up quickly at the Edmonton City Hall last Monday. They were there to hear what would be said concerning a grocery store coming to Edmonton. By meeting time at 4, City Hall was literally packed with residents interested in what would be said.

The speaker was Tracy Worley from the Houchens Food Group. He began by telling the crowd about Houchens Food Group. “We’re the largest employee-owned company in the United States. So, when you spend money with us, it stays in this community, because the owners of our company are the employees that work in our store. So, it’s important that not only that we support them, but we’re supporting community members, right? So, we’re not sending the profits of any grocery store or any ACE store or any store we have into a big city somewhere for stockholders, because we are stockholders.”

“With me, I have Mr. Brad Dial, who operates our store here and has been a Houchen’s employee for 30 years. Behind me, Stephanie Harris Grant, who’s part of the Houchen’s team as well locally here in Metcalfe County, and Mr. Brandon Shirley, I’m sure most of you know who is vice president of Houchen’s Industries from the county. We all want to be here, and we all want to provide you guys with the very best grocery store we could provide. But I do think it’s very important for us to align what we can deliver with what your expectations are, because for me to come in here and say that we’re going to provide you as cheap a groceries as you can find at Walmart, I’m not going to lie to you. I’m not going to tell you we can do that. We can’t do that. We will be a staple of the community that supports the community?”

He went on to state that today was just the beginning, “We’re going to research this, and now we’re going to talk to customers and to try to get what the expectations are…As far as cleanliness, as far as service, as far as community involvement, it’ll be the best store, grocery store that you get, or best store in general that you guys have had in that location since there’s no doubt about that, we’ll provide the very best.”

He asked the crowd what they wanted in a grocery store. One lady answered a fresh meat department, and another said a deli where customers can get lunch. A gentleman added weekly specials.

In response, Worley replied, “I’ve launched some studies about what we think we can deliver to Kentucky, and part of it being a fresh deli and fresh meat, fresh produce…”

He went on to explain that Houchens’s has two IGA formats, a priceless format, and a regular IGA format. “It will not be a regular IGA format.”

State Representative Amy Neighbors was present and stated, “…for far too long, Edmonton has been what is called a food desert… anything from the state level that would allow you all to be able to bring this store to our community, I’m in full support of that.” adding,  “And at the end of the day, if we can’t offer the basic needs of a grocery store in our town, how can we ever expect to bring other businesses and industries to our community.”

One lady in the crowd said, “We have a lot of diabetics in the area.” She then asked if the store would carry brands for diabetics.

Grant replied, “I work in that world every day. I’m the corporate buyer for the grocery store. I go in and out and try to figure out whatever the store needs. So, I mean, if there is a need, we’ll buy it, put it back for you. I mean, we want to be local.”

Someone in the crowd asked, “Do you have some sort of idea of what timeline you’re looking at making the decision?”

Worley responded, “I wish I could tell you that, unfortunately, I don’t control the maintenance department or the development department… So, I do know that I’ve already had our development people out here… So, we’re ready to move at any point in time.”

The mayor and council members thanked them for coming and talking to the community. It sure looked like the community came out in full support.