KEESEVILLE — A small farm store located inside Keeseville Pharmacy is about to get a major boost, thanks to an Innovation Grant from Adirondack Health Institute.
The Farmacy is a partnership between AdkAction, a local nonprofit, and the Keeseville Pharmacy, an independently owned business.
The expansion will include the addition of three glass-door merchandising coolers, a display freezer, gondola shelving and a bulk food unit.
“The addition of the bulk food unit is particularly exciting because dried goods are critical staples, and they are cheaper and come with less wasteful plastic than their packaged counterparts,” Brittany Christenson, executive director of AdkAction, said in the release.
“In addition to equipment and merchandising, AdkAction has hired a full-time staff person to oversee the expansion, create a toolkit for replication and expand the model to an additional location in Essex County.
“The second location is going to be identified in early 2019,” Christenson said.
FOCUS ON COMMUNITY
AdkAction partnered with Essex County Health Department, as part of the Well Fed Essex County Collaborative, to apply for the funding from Adirondack Health Institute.
“I feel so privileged to have become a part of AdkAction’s vision to improve healthy local food access in Keeseville and surrounding communities,” Keeseville Pharmacy owner Dan Bosley said in a news release.
“As a business owner, I love the support of AdkAction, its contributors and their willingness to seek out and obtain grants for the Farmacy expansion.
“As a pharmacist and compassionate caregiver to the people I serve, I feel that ‘community’ is really at the forefront of what this project is all about, and I am not only excited for what this means to me, my store and the customers I currently serve but also what this will do for additional communities going forward.”
MORE ACCESS
Keeseville Pharmacy now accepts SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits.
AdkAction is also unrolling an incentive coupon program that will make it even easier for low-income residents to buy local food.
The agency has also been coordinating free cooking classes to help area residents learn to cook from scratch with local ingredients.
The cooking classes were made possible through funding from the Generous Acts Fund at Adirondack Foundation.
AdkAction acknowledged Capital District Physician’s Health Plan, MVP Health Care, and Hudson Headwaters Health Network for their sponsorship of the project.
LEARN MORE
For more information on the Farmacy project or to donate, visit AdkAction.org/project/farmacy
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Original Article: https://www.pressrepublican.com/news/local_news/farmacy-project-to-expand/article_04d76f5d-a0d6-5e6f-894b-75133725bfc3.html
