Free Grocery Store Opens in Georgia Middle School

Amerigroup Georgia, Goodr aim to address food insecurity

4/3/2023

A ribbon-cutting ceremony for a free grocery store featured remarks from Goodr Founder and CEO Jasmine Crowe-Houston, Amerigroup Georgia President Mel Lindsey and Pointe South Middle School Principal Kimberly Grant.

To help address food insecurity experienced by families, health care company Amerigroup Georgia is sponsoring a free grocery store located inside Pointe South Middle School, in Jonesboro, Ga. The store will enable students and their families to shop for high-quality, nutritious groceries at no cost.

“Food insecurity has significant detrimental effects on health, especially in children, and can leave devastating, long-lasting impacts across communities, so it is critical we develop and implement resources for our neighbors who need them most,” said Mel Lindsey, president of Atlanta-based Amerigroup Georgia. “This latest partnership with Goodr reflects Amerigroup’s ongoing support for strategic, innovative opportunities that address the health needs of some of some of our most vulnerable, underserved communities in Georgia.”

[Read more: "Careit Food Rescue App Launches Nationwide"]

Sustainable waste management and hunger relief company Goodr first teamed with Amerigroup to host a free Pop-Up Grocery Market in August 2022. The event provided 200 families with no-cost groceries, including meat, fresh produce, shelf-stable items, eggs and bread.

“Goodr is humbled to have the opportunity to provide this service to the students of Pointe South Middle School and their families, thanks to Amerigroup,” noted Jasmine Crowe-Houston, founder and CEO of Atlanta-based Goodr, a Certified B Corp. “Children cannot be expected to perform at par in the classroom with an empty stomach, and teachers should be able to stand in front of a class full of kids who are at their best. My mission is to chip away at this problem, one school at a time, until food access issues for children are a thing of the past.”

The company intends to have 12 operational Goodr Grocery Stores in U.S. cities by the end of the first quarter, with plans to operate 50 by the end of 2023. It also recently unveiled a mobile version of the Goodr Grocery Store, a shoppable 26-foot customized truck that can travel to rural areas and food deserts.

Sources estimate that roughly 1.1 million Georgians currently struggle with hunger. Of those, 360,000 are children.