JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A new grocery on Jacksonville's Northside is helping to serve those in need.
Unlike many food pantries, Making Ends Meat allows people to pick what type of a food they want for free.
Overflow Health Alliance opened the store and operates it.
“It’s an idea that we thought was worthy to bring to this community - a community that has been deemed to be a food desert area for so long, a community that has been kind of left behind," said the Chief Operating Officer of Overflow Health Alliance Marcus Harden-Givens.
In the past week, Feeding Northeast Florida has donated more than $60,000 to the non-profit.
“Instead of giving them boxes of food we decided to give them an experience where they actually choose exactly what they want so that they can feel empowered and also the sense of worthiness of picking their food everyday," Harden-Givens explained.
The store served more than 200 people on its first day, providing a variety of stations for customers to pick up food.
“What we decided to do was add a tasting station to this grocery store so we can actually on-site cook and prepare those things that feeding Northeast Florida is providing to us," Harden-Givens said.
The grocery store, located at 4220 Moncrief Rd., is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday.
Overflow Health Alliance encourages people to sign up at ITS resource center.
“I’m grateful to God first of all for the opportunity to be able to serve the community and second I’m grateful to be able to answer the call this is a call in this area that has been for years," said Harden Givens.