FOOD OASIS
Navy veteran brings relief to local food desert
Access to affordable groceries just got a whole lot easier for many residents in northeast Oklahoma City.
A new Save-A-Lot will provide access to fresh foods for many in one of Oklahoma City’s food deserts, an area where many low-income residents are living more than a mile from the nearest grocery store. The store is owned by a group of military veterans who open stores in similar need-based locations across the country.
“Honor Capital, we are a veteran-owned small business that set out on a mission to eliminate food deserts across the country,” Honor Capital co-owner and Navy veteran Marcus Scarborough said. “This is our ninth
store — ninth food desert that we’ve been able to come in and bring fresh affordable produce and fresh cut meat to communities that need it.”
Food deserts are defined by the USDA as a lowincome tract with at least 500 people, or 33 percent of the population, living more than 1 mile from the nearest supermarket, supercenter or large grocery store. The opening of a new Save-A-Lot at 1124 NE 36 serves a portion of the city that for years has qualified as a USDA-defined “food desert.”
The store is in a shopping center developing under a tax increment financing district, and supported by Ward 7 City Councilor John Pettis.
“It is definitely great to see the northeast shopping center being a place where people can shop for goods,” Pettis said. “It was just a few years ago it seemed abandoned, and now it’s turning into a thriving shopping center for northeast Oklahoma City.”
Pettis is particularly excited to have a veteran-owned business overseeing the anchor grocery store in the development.
“For the past several years, I’ve been meeting with the Save-A-Lot corporate folks and Marcus and his team,” Pettis said. “When you have a group of veterans who served our country, typically you see people who are very successful business people. I have heard good things from elected officials in other areas (with Honor Capital-owned stores) and they have nothing but great things to say about Marcus and his group.”
Dedicated to serving
Honor Capital was founded out of desire to serve low-income residential areas with affordable housing, but Scarborough said he and his colleagues quickly realized the need in America for fresh and affordable grocery options in many communities.
“Through networking and some business partners, we ran into Save-A-Lot and they’re one of the few grocery stores that have a franchise-type model,” Scarborough said. “We saw a (marriage) of two missions. A grocery store that was a smaller format that could go in smaller communities that also carried fresh produce and fresh cut meat. That is usually a missing component for the most part in a lot of these communities and we said, ‘Let’s do it. Let’s make this happen.’”
Their first store opened in Columbia, South Carolina, in 2015, Scarborough said. The Oklahoma City location was settled on after spending time to find a spot that would fulfill their mission of solving food access problems.
“If we can go out there, attack it and continue to serve our country this way, then let’s do it,” Scarborough said. “Food access should be a basic human right.”
Pettis toured the store before it opened Friday, and he said he met a woman outside who was almost in tears she was so happy to have a grocery store so close.
“People are actually excited about this, and that means something,” Pettis said. “I’m just excited along with the community.”
Dollar Tree is also open in the shopping center, with space available for several more tenants. Property owner Charles Shadid said there have been many conversations with potential tenants, but no leases have been signed.
“We are hoping this will be the catalyst to open up the northeast for future development also,” Shadid said.
Pettis expects the shopping center will begin to fill quickly, now that a grocery store is up and running.
Save-A-Lot occupies an 18,000-square-foot portion of the development, and employs 19 people, Scarborough said. Honor Capital secured financial approval in the summer, they began moving things in during October and opened for business last week.
Clean, full and fresh
While there are other Save-A-Lots, Scarborough said he and his fellow Honor Capital owners work to make sure their locations stand out.
“We like to say our stores are a cut above the rest,” Scarborough said. “We want our customers to come in and be impressed from the moment they walk in the door all the way until they walk out of the checkout, and in order to do that it’s got to be clean, it’s got to be full and it’s got to be fresh.”
Filling a need in a food desert is only helpful if your prices are competitive, and Scarborough says his store takes a no-frills approach to passing savings on to the consumer.
The store location features a butcher on-site, something many stores are abandoning, Scarborough said.
Scarborough, though not a native of Oklahoma City, has seen the good that can come from something as simple as a grocery store. A native of Columbia, South Carolina, he witnessed the effect Honor Capital’s first store had on what many considered a “bad part of town.”
“For me, it was crazy to put one in an area that was supposed to be the rough part of town,” Scarborough said. “The one thing I learned is the people who live in these communities perceived as ‘bad’ — they’re just like us and they need groceries.”
He’s excited to see how the Oklahoma City location can affect the local residents.
“These stores, as simple as they seem, become a cornerstone of the community,” Scarborough said.