Have You Heard of the Feed A Friend Community Meal & Thrift Store in Owensboro? (GALLERY)

Owensboro's Feed A Friend Community Meal and Thrift Store is seeking volunteers to help continue to provide services to those in need.

WHAT IS FEED A FRIEND?

Feed a Friend celebrated its five-year anniversary in April at the most recent location.   Alan Veach, one of the ministry organizers, told me all about the community meal and thrift store;

Feed a Friend Community Dinner is a twice a week soup kitchen at the fellowship hall of Unity Fellowship UCC 625 Allen Street.  We serve at 5:30 on Wednesday and Friday.  Our doors open at 5:15 so people can come in find a seat, freshen up and get a cold glass of water.   While the main purpose of our thrift store is to help fund the community dinners and Veterans' Food Pantry (we do offer food boxes to vets and families w/ the proper documentation and at least a day's notice.) we do offer limited assistance w/ clothing for individuals.  However, there are certain requirements for those requesting items from the store.

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THRIVING WITH THRIFT

When the group started they realized they were not always going to be able to support the meal with the donations so they had to think fast in order to be able to continue serving the community and those in need so they decided to open a thrift store and here's how they started according to Alan;

Because donations, both cash and kind,  were limited and did not meet all the dinner's needs Unity Fellowship allowed us to "take over" the old gym behind the church itself and turn that space into a thrift store.  Using donations of used clothing, household items, some furniture, books, etc, we transformed 111 East Seventh Street into a source of income to help meet some of the needs, i.e.,  having to buy anything that was not donated to the kitchen.  In the three years we have grown out of just the gym itself and now use all but one of the former Sunday school rooms adjoining the main floor space.  This allows rooms for children, plus size and shoes.

WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU VISIT THE THRIFT STORE

Most clothing items are $.50 a piece w/children's being $.25.  Shoes and purses are also $.50.  However,  we offer a $3 and $5 bag special every week.  Any clothing you can get in a large paper grocery bag is just $3.  Depending on the items, jeans take more space than shirts, mores bags will bring the cost per item down to a dime. Toddler and baby clothes can be as cheap as a nickel.  Any CLOTH item, blankets, sheets, towels, etc can be included w/ the clothing put into a tall kitchen flex bag is $5.  Most items average out to about $.10 an item which is a major deal.

HOW CAN YOU HELP

Feed A Friend needs volunteers to serve meals on the days they are open and also to work in the thrift store.  Since they do not have any paid staff they are strictly running on volunteers.  If you would like to volunteer you can contact Alan at 270-683-6103.

At this time we are only open on Saturdays, 8 - 2. However, we will be giving an expanded schedule a trial run the first week of August.  In addition to our normal Saturday hours, we will be open Tuesday thru Friday 10 am - 2 pm,  August 3 - 6.