Historical Award Impacts

Location: St. Paul, MN

Award: $200,000  |  Year: 2020

The African Economic Development Solutions (AEDS) is a nonprofit organization and certified CDFI founded in 2009 in the Twin Cities to build wealth within African immigrant communities. AEDS will use HFFI funds to purchase an 8,190 square foot site in the in the Hamline-Midway section of St. Paul and develop Pan-African immigrant cooperative market with retail food sales, a commercial kitchen and bakery, a new office headquarters, and community meeting and gathering spaces. The community-focused cooperative market will help preserve access to cultural foods among low-income African immigrants in St Paul.

Location: Cincinnati, Ohio

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $80,000  |  Year: 2019

Apple Street Market Cooperative is developing a 16,332 square foot full-service grocery store in the diverse Northside neighborhood. The community- and worker-owned store will provide the low- and moderate-income community with access to healthy, fresh, and affordable food, while increasing economic opportunities for residents. The HFFI grant will support predevelopment needs including financial modeling, market study, architectural design, and technology.

Location: Crow Reservation, Montana

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

Apsaalooke Abundance is Here is a food sovereignty work group based on the Crow Reservation in Southeast Montana that is working to complete a community-based food assessment and exploring opportunities to improve food access. Technical assistance will advance Apsaalooke Abundance’s work by supporting a community-involved feasibility study for a mobile market or other food retail outlet.

Location: Stockton, California

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

The small low-income Cambodian immigrant and refugee community that resides in the Park Village Apartments (PVA) in Stockton California struggles with access to healthy, affordable, and culturally relevant foods. APSARA seeks to remedy these issues by establishing a cooperative grocery store at PVA. Technical assistance will provide a feasibility study, business planning, and resident training.

Location: Willow, Alaska

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $200,000  |  Year: 2019

Black Bear Farms, a local vegetable grower and distributor in Willow, Alaska, will establish a permanent, year-round, indoor-outdoor retail store with HFFI support. The Black Bear Farms Market will offer Black Bear Farms products as well as other produce and staple foods from local producers. This project will expand access to fresh food for rural low-income residents and provide support to the growing local food economy.

Location: Charles Town, WV

Award: $125,000  |  Year: 2020

In 2017 Charles Town, in partnership with a local food and farmers market organization, GAP, launched Bushel & Peck, a locally-sourced retail grocery in a historic building, providing locally-sourced, healthy, and organic staple and perishable foods (vegetables, fruits, meats, milks and other grocery items) to Jefferson County. In 2020, Bushel & Peck met local COVID-19 food challenges by providing food sales through an online ordering and curbside auto/pedestrian pickup approach. An HFFI grant will help Bushel & Peck expand its wholesale aggregation operations and direct-to-consumer curbside sales by expanding into an adjacent warehouse facility.

Location: Santa Rosa, CA

Award: $182,859  |  Year: 2020

California Indian Museum and Cultural Center (CIMCC) is a nonprofit, Native led organization that works to revitalize traditional food systems in Sonoma, Lake and Mendocino Counties in Northern California where there are 24 tribes and 23,000+ Native people. With support from Native American Agriculture Fund and First Nations Development Institute, among other local partners and entrepreneurs, CIMCC provides technical assistance to youth starting native foods businesses. An HFFI grant will help CIMCC develop a California Indian Traditional Foods Incubator with resilient solar power to increase access to traditional foods for retail sales in Sonoma, Lake and Mendocino Counties.

Location: Detroit, Michigan

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

The Detroit Black Community Food Security Network is developing the Detroit Food Commons Development, a mixed-use project that includes a 12,000 sq. ft. retail grocery space and four incubator kitchen spaces. Technical assistance will support project management to assist with predevelopment activities.

Location: Cleveland, Ohio

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $76,600  |  Year: 2019

Environmental Health Watch is partnering with several organizations in support of the Kinsman-Central Grocery Store Cooperative Development Project. HFFI grant funds will allow Environmental Health Watch to conduct market analysis, strategic planning, consumer surveys, and community engagement, which will help them determine the feasibility of a cooperatively-owned supermarket in the Kinsman-Central community.

Location: Erie, Pennsylvania

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

Erie Downtown Development Corporation plans to create a public market, food hall, and commercial incubator kitchen within vacant, blighted, and underutilized historic properties they acquired on North Park Row in downtown Erie, Pennsylvania. Technical assistance will support EDDC to develop a management and operations plan.

Location: Honolulu, HI

Award: $160,000  |  Year: 2020

Farm Link Hawai’i (FLH) is an online local food marketplace and delivery network serving retail consumers in urban and rural O‘ahu, which imports 90% of its food by container ship. Founded in 2015, FLH has established an inter-island food system, buys significant volume from local producers, and provides aggregation infrastructure and coordination for the food supply chain. FLH has recently received authorization to accept SNAP benefits, and will use HFFI funds to expand the food hub to serve more SNAP customers.

Location: Brooklyn, New York

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

Enterprise Community Partners of New York City is partnering with several NYC-based organizations to pilot a resident-led collective that opens new online channels for accessing more affordable and convenient food at the Farragut Houses public housing development in Brooklyn. Technical assistance will support the project partners with business model development and an evaluation plan for the pilot.

Location: Laramie, WY

Award: $110,000  |  Year: 2020

Feeding Laramie Valley (FLV) is a program of Action Resources International, a Laramie, Wyoming based social services organization. FLV serves Albany County, Wyoming, and partners with local agriculture and retail businesses to promote food security, and create a sustainable, equitable, just food system. An HFFI grant will help FLV develop a mobile market, partnership with retail grocery store Big Hollow Food Co-op, and local food producers and distributors, that will offer access to fresh and local food through regular mobile market stops to isolated individuals and families.

Location: Albany, GA

Award: $150,000  |  Year: 2020

The City of Albany, GA is strategically focused on improving the quality of life of South Albany residents and addressing food access for residents. The Department of Community and Economic Development is working with Food for Less Albany, an affiliate of Piggly Wiggly, to bring groceries to a development in South Albany, an area with limited access to grocery stores since a closure in 2018. An HFFI grant will support the development of full-service independent grocery store that offers high quality food items at affordable prices with a low-cost business model.

Location: Rochester, New York

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

Foodlink, the regional food bank based in Rochester, NY, serves a 10-county area in the Finger Lakes. To improve food equity and access to healthy food, Foodlink also operates the Curbside Market, a mobile market that sells fruits, vegetables, eggs and nuts at more than 80 sites per week in low-income areas without access to supermarkets. To improve and expand the work they started with the Curbside Market, Foodlink proposes to build a full-service grocery in the City of Rochester. Technical assistance will support the initial development of this project with a feasibility study.

Location: Chicago, Illinois

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $185,000  |  Year: 2019

Forty Acres Fresh Market and Westside Health Authority are partnering for the Austin Grocery Initiative, which will open a 3,000 square foot specialty grocery store that provides affordable fresh food for the west side neighborhood of Austin, Chicago. Forty Acres Market will operate a pop-up market in Austin, one weekend per month for a year, while in the predevelopment stage of the brick and mortar location.

Location: Tacoma, WA

Award: $53,597  |  Year: 2020

Tacoma Farmers Market (TFM) is a 30-year old organization that creates vibrant marketplaces where local farms, small businesses, and organizations connect directly with the community by supporting all residents, regardless of income, in accessing local foods and creating paths to business ownership. Started as a COVID-10 emergency response in partnership with local farms and community partners, the Fresh Express Mobile Market will use HFFI grant support to re-open as a retail model that accepts SNAP and offers 1:1 matching discounts for SNAP purchases.

Location: Manchester, NH

Award: $100,000  |  Year: 2020

Organization for Refugee and Immigrant Success (ORIS) is a community-based social and economic support organization located in Manchester and Concord, New Hampshire, since 2005. In early 2020, ORIS opened a food hub in downtown Manchester to aggregate, prepare, and distribute product from local farms including farmers in ORIS’s incubatory farming programs. ORIS will update its mobile market to sell staple foods including meat, dairy and eggs, open a retail site at the Food Hub, expand sales into local corner stores, and support marketing through a community food ambassador program.

Location: Macon, Georgia

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

The Georgia Wellness and Fitness Festival, Inc. wants to create a stationary and mobile farmers market for low-income residents in Macon, Georgia. Technical assistance will support hiring farmers market consultants to provide training and assist in planning the market.

Location: Pine Ridge, South Dakota

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $100,000  |  Year: 2019

Buche Foods will reopen the grocery store located on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. After years of unstable operations and poor management, Buche Foods was awarded the contract by the Oglala Sioux Tribal Council to revitalize and manage the grocery store on the reservation. The grant will support the relaunch of the store and will bring stability to a distressed community.

Location: Fargo, North Dakota

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

The Great Plains Food Bank seeks to expand their ability to reach communities in need of access to groceries through a retail mobile market. Technical assistance will provide a feasibility and market study to examine the opportunities and sustainability for mobile markets within the state.

Location: Marks, MS

Award: $200,000  |  Year: 2020

The Quitman County Board of Supervisors is collaborating with the City of Marks and Jeffcoat’s Family Market, an independent grocer, to re-open a full-service grocery store in Marks, Mississippi, an underserved community in the rural Mississippi Delta. An HFFI grant will help Jeffcoat’s Family Market renovate and fit out a site acquired from the City of Marks. A partnership with Mississippi Delta Council for Farm Workers Opportunities food hub will supply fresh, local produce to the store.

Location: Lexington, KY

Award: $140,030  |  Year: 2020

North Limestone Community Development Corporation (NoLi CDC) is a community development organization based in the North Limestone neighborhood of Lexington, Kentucky, a low-income neighborhood with limited access to fresh food for retail sale. An HFFI grant will help NoLi CDC develop Julietta Market, which will be a non-profit multi-vendor public market in the heart of the redevelopment of a former bus station building. Julietta Market will offer for retail food sales, as well as shared kitchen space for food production and aggregation facilities, serving neighborhood retail food customers as well as local producers, including the community of local Black urban farmers.

Location: Dona Ana County, NM, and El Paso, TX

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $250,000  |  Year: 2019

La Semilla Food Center seeks to decrease the prevalence of food deserts in the Paso del Norte region of southern New Mexico and El Paso, Texas. Rural populations in this community face considerable challenges accessing food due to limited transportation options and the lack of retail food locations in the region. The grant will help La Semilla consolidate their mobile retail efforts at three of their most successful locations, after a three-year mobile market pilot program. La Semilla will also use the grant to establish a micro-retail market, Tiendita, as a permanent home base of operations.

Location: Lake Village, Arkansas

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

The community of Lake Village is working with partners to explore a full-service food retail project to serve the community. Technical assistance will help support a market study that will include a retail assessment, competition analysis, and an analysis of consumer needs.

Location: Louisville, Kentucky

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

Louisville residents west and east of downtown want to open the Louisville Community Grocery – a community-owned grocery store that will improve access to fresh, local and affordable food for residents who live in neighborhoods with limited access to food. Technical assistance will support community engagement and an ownership campaign as well as business planning.

Location: Zuni, NM

Award: $200,000  |  Year: 2020

Established in 1988, Major Market is a company owned operated by the Tsabetsaye family, enrolled Tribal members of Zuni Pueblo community centered grocery store dedicated to healthy eating through fresh produce, custom-cut meats, traditional Native American ingredients, non-perishable foods, standard staples, and purified water. An HFFI grant will support the reopening of the Major Market with inventory, storage, and broadband.

Location: Saint Louis, MO

Award: $116,455  |  Year: 2020

The MARSH Food Cooperative is a new nonprofit cooperative organization located in the Carondelet neighborhood of South St. Louis, MO, a low income, low access former riverfront industrial neighborhood that has had significant disinvestment and has few fresh food options. MARSH is a start-up, unique cooperative model that is women/non-binary managed and currently operates a sliding-scale outdoor grocery market and an online grocery ordering system to build visibility and ownership. An HFFI grant will help the cooperative develop a storefront grocery.

Location: Marty, SD

Award: $150,000  |  Year: 2020

Buche Foods operates five independent grocery stores in Gregory, Mission, Pine Ridge, Oacoma and Wagner, South Dakota, near or on Indian Reservations. Buche Foods grocery stores serve rural locations, providing access to fresh, quality food and employment opportunities. In partnership with Yankton Sioux Tribal leaders, Buche Foods seeks to pilot a community-based drop-off program, extending the reach of fresh food access in rural, remote locations.

Location: Drew, MS and Shaw, MS

Award: $170,000  |  Year: 2020

A minority and women owned CDFI established in 1994, HOPE works to leverage the power of the financial system to improve the lives of distressed, underserved people across the Deep South. An HFFI grant will support the Mississippi Delta Online Grocery Delivery Program (MDOGDP) which will use a hub and spoke model – where individual grocery orders are aggregated using online grocery ordering software for a retail partner to fill, and then transported the last mile from the retail partner back to the community site for pickup by local residents.

Location: Flint, MI

Award: $200,000  |  Year: 2020

North Flint Reinvestment Corporation is a Black-led non-profit community development corporation established in 2010 that uses a place-based, holistic approach to revitalizing distressed neighborhoods by implementing catalytic, community-led l revitalization strategies. An HFFI grant will support the development of the North Flint Food Market, a full-service retail grocery store structured as a resident-driven, community-owned food cooperative. The North Flint Food Market seeks to meet the food and water access needs of the community affected both by the Flint water crisis and the closure of two main grocery stores in the area.

Location: St. Louis, Missouri

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

OFS and the Normandy Schools Collaborative are working together to increase access to fresh, affordable, local food by creating the Normandy Community Market and Learning Kitchen. Technical assistance will help OFS conduct a market analysis study and develop a business plan.

Location: Oshkosh, WI

Award: $145,000  |  Year: 2020

The Oshkosh Food Co-op is a member-owned cooperative seeking to establish the first food co-op in Northeast Wisconsin. Established in 2018, the cooperative has been working to grow member-ownership, study market needs in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and establish strategic partnerships with community and health organizations. HFFI grant funds will help the Co-op open its doors at a site in the central city, where many residents are without convenient transportation to grocery stores, and fresh food is scarce and expensive.

Location: Philadelphia, PA

Award: $131,600  |  Year: 2020

Philly Foodworks (PFW) is a food hub that works to develop a reliable regional food system for Philadelphia. PFW works with local farms and producers to aggregate product and support their growth while building markets for local food. PFW is moving its operations to a new warehouse in the Nicetown – Tioga section of Philadelphia where an HFFI grant will help PFW develop an onsite retail location and expand aggregation operations for its direct-to-consumer CSA model.

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Location: Todd County, South Dakota

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $150,000  |  Year: 2019

The REDCO Food Sovereignty Initiative plans to pursue mobile retail market opportunities on the Rosebud Reservation, which is home to the Sicangu Lakota Oyate. REDCO will use the grant to leverage and expand the successful Keya Wakpala Farmer’s Market and to explore the economic feasibility and impact of operating a year-round mobile market throughout the region.

Location: Sumter, South Carolina

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $110,000  |  Year: 2019

Rogers Vegetable Farm will launch a mobile market that will provide residents of rural Lee and Sumpter counties with access to locally grown, farm-fresh produce and staple foods. The mobile market will stop at community sites and healthcare centers and partner with local organizations to offer cooking demonstrations and produce prescriptions. The Rogers Vegetable Farm Mobile Market will provide increased access to fresh, locally grown healthier food options and employment opportunities for community members.

Location: Roanoke, Virginia

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

Since 2016, the Center for Community Health Innovation at Roanoke College has been engaging partners in predevelopment efforts for a grocery store in the low-income, low-access community of Melrose-Orange. Technical assistance will provide Roanoke College and partners with feasibility studies, site planning, and capitalization planning for the store.

Location: New Orleans, LA

Award: $200,000  |  Year 2020

Sankofa CDC is a community development organization based in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, that is led by African American residents of the community in which it works. Sankofa CDC operates a successful weekly open-air produce store that serves as a food hub to work with local farmers, fishers, wholesalers and producers to bring their products to market in an underserved community of New Orleans. An HFFI grant will support the development of the Fresh Stop Market in a new green mixed-use development on a commercial corridor.

Location: Winston-Salem, NC

Award: $200,000  |  Year: 2020

SHARE was founded in 2016 by Revs. Willard Bass and Gary Williams with the mission of providing healthy, affordable food and nutrition education to those living in underserved communities. in the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County area. In Winston Salem, 49.7% of Black residents in the city have low or no access to healthy food. An HFFI grant will help SHARE develop the Harvest Market, a full-service grocery cooperative open to the general public.

Location: New Bern, North Carolina

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $33,000  |  Year: 2019

The Veterans Employment Base Camp and Organic Garden (VEBCOG) is a nonprofit and social enterprise organization located in Eastern North Carolina that provides healthy food workshops, agricultural events, and gardening programs for children in an underserved community. VEBCOG will develop and open a Market Complex that will offer fresh and staple foods for sale, a community kitchen and café, and include youth programming, training, and employment opportunities.

Location: Portland, OR

Award: $65,422  |  Year: 2020

Village Market is a nonprofit grocery store located in New Columbia, Oregon’s largest affordable housing neighborhood. Opened in 2011, Village Market is operated by Janus Youth Programs, an organization that does community development work in the area. The Market offers affordable and accessible groceries and provides discounts, produce incentives and free produce to ensure access to healthy staples and fruits and vegetables for residents. An HFFI grant will support the renovation of the store’s produce department.

Location: Charleston, West Virginia

Grant Type: Financial Assistance; $215,400  |  Year: 2019

The West Virginia Food & Farm Coalition, along with healthy food access and food system development partners throughout the state, will launch the WV Grocer Lab to support food access in three communities in West Virginia and develop a coordinated approach for future retail development in the region. The WV Grocer Lab will provide consulting services, equipment, inventory, and other supplies to the two rural and one urban retail supermarket projects. The project will also develop a learning network among the retail models to help grocers access regional food supply chain networks, reduce inventory costs and enhance long-term sustainability.

Location: Denver, Colorado

Grant Type: Technical Assistance  |  Year: 2019

The Westwood Food Cooperative (WFC) is a cooperative business being incubated by Re:Vision, a 501c3 organization based in Denver, CO. Technical assistance will support Westwood Food Cooperative’s predevelopment by updating the project’s feasibility study and business plan.