A line formed down the street from Forty Acres Fresh Market at 5713 W. Chicago Ave. the morning of Nov. 5, the fifth day that the federal government froze Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits during its shutdown. Last Wednesday, about 100 people got $50 vouchers for Forty Acres through a giveaway organized by Ald. Chris Taliaferro and Ira Acree, pastor of Greater St. John Bible Church in Austin, to help those who are food insecure during the SNAP freeze.
Liz Abunaw, the owner of Forty Acres Fresh Market, described the giveaway as “chaotic” but “a day that brought in a lot of revenue and helped a lot of people.”
Where to find free food on the West Side
- Soul Food Lounge in North Lawndale is serving free meals every Tuesday from noon to 3 p.m., when owner Quentin Love closes the restaurant to paying customers and gives free food to anyone who’s hungry.
- The Firehouse Community Arts Center at 2111 S. Hamlin in North Lawndale gives away free hot lunch every Thursday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
- Through a program with the Lawndale Christian Community Church, Lou Malnati’s is giving out $10 coupons to the food insecure.
- Inspiration Corporation at 3504 W. Lake St. in Garfield Park has free breakfast Monday through Friday starting at 6 a.m.
- The Love Fridge has refrigerators of free food at A House in Austin at 533 N. Pine Ave., the Austin Fridge at 945 W. Division St, and Stone Temple at 3622 W. Douglas Blvd.
- Find food pantries and soup kitchens on the West Side through The Greater Chicagoland Food Depository by visiting https://www.chicagosfoodbank.org/find-food-2/#find-food
With Forty Acres Fresh Market opening in September, the independent, full-service grocery store has only been open a bit over a month, making it difficult to tell how much of its revenue comes from those who use SNAP benefits or if that revenue is decreasing because of the SNAP suspension.
“Even if we only had five SNAP customers and they stopped coming, I would still feel the loss of those five people. They’re our neighbors,” Abunaw said. “As a business owner and a person who is in this community, I don’t want to see anybody go without food that they normally would have had.”
Though Abunaw said it’s “diabolical” how “the federal government is playing these reindeer games with people up and down the food and supply chain,” she said Forty Acres isn’t going anywhere.
“There’s this misconception that it’s going to shut us down,” Abunaw said of the hold on SNAP benefits. But that doesn’t mean a potential loss of business wouldn’t affect Forty Acres as a new, independent grocery store. “Whether it’s 5%, 12%, 15%, 20% of our revenue coming from SNAP, as a new store, we’re not in a position to lose any of that and not feel the impact.”
Even if those who use SNAP benefits stopped shopping at Forty Acres, Abunaw would still need to keep the shelves stocked and the store staffed for existing customers, and Forty Acres’ refrigeration would still need to run constantly.
“Every single dollar matters to us because grocery store margins are so narrow. It’s a volume business, so any loss of volume hurts,” Abunaw said.
But the SNAP benefit suspension could affect more than smaller businesses like Forty Acres. When businesses feel a financial strain, so do their landlords and any other industry of goods, services or housing that the business owner and store staff spend money on.
“There’s an infinite effect of that dollar and how it circulates in our economy,” Abunaw said. With SNAP, “the government is basically creating a currency that can be used within the economy. When you cut off that currency, you affect the entire economy, not just the person receiving that benefit.”
SNAP at Forty Acres
Forty Acres has a Link Match program, which gives customers who use their Illinois Link card, where SNAP benefits populate, a coupon for the dollar amount they spend, up to $25 per swipe. Forty Acres also offers a $5 delivery fee for people who buy groceries using SNAP benefits. The typical delivery fee is calculated based on the customer’s zip code.
Abunaw said SNAP makes up a very small portion of Forty Acres’ delivery, an estimated five regular subscribers among hundreds of delivery customers.
“I think there were expectations that SNAP would be a higher percentage of our revenue than it has been thus far,” Abunaw said. “I think the narrative is that ‘Because it’s Austin, their customers must be overwhelmingly food insecure.’”
Abunaw said that’s not the case, especially considering Forty Acres is still building its customer base. Though it’s in Austin, Forty Acres is a half mile from Oak Park, where many customers come from to shop.
“It is a vibrant mix of demographics — racially, economically, it’s a mixed customer base,” Abunaw said of Forty Acres’ clientele. “We have low-income customers, we have high-income customers, and we have customers in the middle. And our goal is to have options for everyone.”
Even without considering Oak Park, Austin is a mixed-income community. Though, according to the Chicago Health Atlas, nearly 40% of Austin households use SNAP benefits.
“I don’t think people thought of Forty Acres as being a competitive option. I think they thought of it as being a helping option” for those in need, Abunaw said. “As people discover the store’s open, once they discover that it’s not a service project, that this is a grocery store that wants our business, they come and they keep coming.”
Abunaw said that, among frustrations with the federal administration, all she can do every day is focus on how to grow her business and customer base.
“Have we done everything right yet? No,” she said. “But are we on a path to what I think [Forty Acres] could be? Yes. Does this government shutdown and the delay in SNAP benefits impede that progress? Yes. But does it destroy it? It doesn’t have to.”