Everything Under The Sun: Keeping Rural Grocery Stores Sustainable

The Onaga Country Market, one of the stores that benefits from the Rural Grocery Initiative.

Certainly, most of those who live in urban areas are familiar with the concept of food deserts, those areas of the city that lack access to fresh, healthy foods. But the same thing also happens in rural areas, despite the fact that people often associate rural areas with farming.

Back in 2007, Kansas State University (KSU), the Center for Engagement and Community Development (CECD), the Kansas Sampler Foundation, and the Huck Boyd Institute for Rural Development, came together in the Rural Grocery Initiative. Essentially, CECD had identified approximately 200 grocery stores in rural areas and started discussions with them. They then developed models of how these stores could be sustained, while maintaining customer loyalty with local residents, and providing a way for these residents to continue to have access to these sources of retail food products.

Some of the long-term goals of the initiative were to develop a rural grocery website, where these rural stores could share information together, to develop and distribute a survey of customer wishes and wants, to research grocery best practices, and to develop a "buy local" campaign.

In June of last year, this consortium of organizations held their fifth National Rural Grocery Summit, which took place over a two-day period. Various stakeholders, including store owners, citizens, funding organizations, government agencies, nonprofits, food suppliers, university researchers, and business leaders, gathered together to discuss the benefits of maintaining grocery stores in rural areas.

Included on the Summit's agenda were such issues as the latest and best thinking regarding sustaining rural grocery stores; some of the latest models providing sources of healthy foods for rural residents; networking and sharing information among store owners and the other stakeholders present; rural grocery best practices; and a path forward in healthy food access. Plans include another Summit that will meet in 2018.

David Proctor, Director of CECD, speaks at Summit IV.

One of the developments arising from the Summit, is the creation of another initiative, involving programming at Kansas State. CECD, which runs out of Kansas State; the department of sociology; and the Food Trust have all come together and formed the Center for Healthy Food Access. This effort does not just address the issue of availability of healthy foods and drinks within rural areas, but also among low-income neighborhoods and communities of color. By examining the issues common in under-served populations, the plan is to provide easy access to affordable healthy foods to every child in the State, a commendable objective, since access to healthy foods is so tied into children's growth and development.