Sustainable Business Network of Massachusetts — City Feed and Supply has been serving its community of Jamaica Plain for over 20 years. Started by co-founders David Warner and Kristine Cortese in the late 1990s, City Feed and Supply is an organic-oriented store, a neighborhood deli and cafe well-known for its unique selection of natural foods, specialty goods, fair trade products and local goods.

Apart from providing its community with delicious bites and coffee, the local store partners with local groups and non-profit organizations that are involved in projects related to hunger relief, organic farming, and community arts and culture among others.

City Feed and Supply has store locations at Centre Street and Boylston Street, and has made a number of adaptations to its store in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, including launching online ordering for pickup and delivery. SBN is proud to recognize the ways in which City Feed and Supply gives back to its community, and the resilience that this local business has shown through the pandemic to continue to be here for its community.

How has City Feed adapted to COVID-19?

When the pandemic shutdown was imminent, we decided to immediately close our Boylston Street store and reduce our services at our Centre Street to grocery only, discontinuing all café and deli offerings as well as all indoor seating. This was beyond what the state and city were requiring at that time, but we felt that the risks were so unknown in the beginning, it was best to reduce operations as much as we could for safety’s sake while still remaining open and providing the essential service of groceries. At that time, we instituted new safety, cleaning and sanitizing protocols and installed Plexiglas barriers for the cashiers. Food service is half of our revenue, so shutting that down was scary, but it was not as scary as the potential repercussions if we did not. We were fortunate to secure a PPP loan to help us make this transition and were able to build back to sustainable operations during that time.

Additionally, we launched our online store with home delivery and curbside pick up within the first two weeks of the shutdown. We were fortunate to have invested in the back end software needed for this over a year prior, so the launch just required a few days of tweaking the details and testing.

I personally did all the deliveries for the first 15 days so that I could see how things worked and feel confident about what we needed to do to pivot to this new service successfully.

Since that time we have gradually expanded our services, adding limited food service options and hours and re-opening our Boylston Street store for limited hours and services. Everything we have done since the beginning has been under the guidelines of what would have been allowed during the original shutdown phase. We did this to maximize our safety concerns and to limit any additional adjustments we would need to make if cases went back on the rise again as they have done recently.

Lastly, and most importantly I think, we have looked for ways to support our community in these trying times.

In my capacity as the Chair of the Steering Committee for JP Local First, we have given grants to all three of our local Main Streets organizations to help them support local businesses with technical and monetary assistance. JP Local First has also initiated a gift card giveaway program to incentivize folks patronizing our local restaurants with take away orders. #JPLovesFood on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.

At City Feed and Supply, in addition to trying to step up our donations to the local organizations we have always supported, we have also made donations to Black Lives Matter and Violence in Boston, and instituted a monthly donation to the Massachusetts Bail Fund. Most recently, we are working with our local food pantry at the First Church to facilitate folks ordering bulk foods that we can store for and deliver to the food pantry as needed. This helps the food pantry with logistics and capacity and provides a way for folks who were given EBT benefits for the pandemic but didn’t need them to donate and support the food pantry.

My advice to fellow business owners who are struggling, is to not be reluctant to ask for help. Your community needs you, they will support you. Don’t be reluctant to ask for help. It is no reflection on your abilities to successfully run a business that you are struggling right now. This is a slowly unfolding tragedy that is impacting everyone and you are not alone. Be safe. Stay strong. Ask for help. — David Warner

For more information, visit: www.sbnmass.org/sustainable-business-awards