Bread of Life sells remarkable variety of food items at low cost

By Kelly Terpstra, kterpstra@charlescitypress.com

The Bread of Life is doing just fine.

Store Manager Terry Stewart wants to let Charles City know that the grocery store outlet that sells salvaged food items is not closing.

Any rumors to the contrary are false.

In fact, Stewart said business has been pretty good at the Bread of Life, owned by Shelly Tilton and located at 809 Wisconsin St. in Charles City.

The store has added roughly 1,500 square feet to its display area. Another 5,000 square feet of new shelving has also been installed and will help sell the vast array of food items that are anywhere from 30-50 percent to as much as 90 percent off the regular retail price, according to Stewart.

“We just rearranged the entire store for more efficiency,” said Stewart. “Why would we have spent thousands of dollars on new shelving just to turn around and close the next week?”

There is a “for sale” sign on the property, but that is not an indication that the store plans to close, Stewart said. Tilton leases the building and it has been on the market for quite some time, said Stewart.

The Bread of Life — open in Charles City since Dec. 1, 2017 — is part of the secondary food market and sells scratch-and-dent food products. The items on the shelves may also have torn labels, or bent cardboard packaging. Other items may have been name brand production overruns or close-out goods.

There is some food that has gone past the “best by” date, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t safe or can’t be consumed, according to Stewart.

“We have a small amount of items that are passed the sell-by date. They’re not expired,” said Stewart. “A sell-by date is not a no-good date.”

Another reason there may have been talk circulating around town that the store may be in jeopardy of closing, Stewart said, is that the Bread of Life is completely phasing out its thrift store that offers clothes and houseware at a reduced rate.

“It was a considerable part of the store, but a very minor part of the sales,” said Stewart. “You can’t dedicate that much space to something that’s not doing what it should be doing.”

Clothing on hand will be free to people in need until Oct. 13, then it will be removed from the store.

More than a quarter-million pounds of food has come through the store since it opened more than 10 months ago. Semi-trucks bring around 43,000 pounds of food items at a time whenever a restock is needed.

The food that is available for resale could be because of a canceled order, late freight arriving or an overturned semi-truck because of an accident.

One particular truckload arrived at Bread of Life because it was originally meant to be shipped to a state fair vendor, but that vendor went out of business. Stewart got a call and was able to acquire the truckload of frozen goods.

Stewart said he has used brokers from Wisconsin, New Jersey, Texas, Minnesota and Iowa.

“We vary what we get and where we get it because it keeps a good mix of groceries,” he said.

The store is fully staffed with nine employees and is open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday. Saturday hours are 9 a.m to 4 p.m. The Bread of Life accepts EBT and SNAP. The Bread of Life also sells Elma Locker meats as well as many non-food items.

The Bread of Life helps with customers that are in a gray area financially – meaning they earn too much money to not receive assistance, but they still find it difficult to make ends meet.

“There is a notch in this world. You can’t get food stamps because you make too much money, but you can’t buy groceries because you don’t make enough,” said Stewart. “We’re a notch store. That notch gets some help through the church partners.”

The term “bread of life” means feeding the hordes, and that is the store’s underlying mission, Stewart added.

He also wanted to make it clear that the Bread of Life is for everyone and that anybody can come in and see what the store has to offer.

“Several of the wealthiest people in town shop here,” said Stewart.