brad-paisley-shouts-out-local-nashville-grocery-store-on-giving-tuesday

Brad Paisley Shouts Out Local Nashville Grocery Store on ‘Giving Tuesday’

Country singer Brad Paisley is reminding his Twitter followers to think of people who are food insecure this holiday season.

Paisley Is Just Sayin’

On Tuesday, Paisley tweeted a photo of The Store in Nashville, adding, “Just sayin…”

The Store is a nonprofit retail grocery store that provides free food to people who need it year-round. It is located in Nashville. 

Paisley and his wife, actress Kimberly Williams-Paisley, got the idea for the grocery store on a trip to Santa Barbara, California. That town plays host to Unity Shoppe, which has been helping local families who are struggling for over 100 years.

“We took our boys to Unity Shoppe to teach them about serving others and giving back to people in need,” Paisley said on The Store’s website. “And we came away surprised by what the organization had taught us. Most people don’t want handouts. They want dignity and respect. Most people want to become self-sufficient.”

Five Times the Need They Anticipated

The couple has partnered with Second Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee to help provide groceries. They are able to offer the food for free because of the donations they receive. 

In addition to free food, The Store also offers nutritional education, cooking classes and a private line of specialty body care products. 

Paisley and Williams-Paisley told the Tennessean they’re distributing “five times” the amount of food they expected to give out before the pandemic hit. 

They provide about 330 bags of groceries each week in Nashville, the Tennessean reported. Roughly 175 of those go out through curbside service, and the rest get delivered.

Nancy Keil, CEO of Second Harvest Food Bank, told the Tennessean that as unemployment rates rise, more households tend to experience food insecurity. Before the pandemic, Second Harvest sent out about 670,000 pounds of food weekly to food distribution partners including The Store. Now it’s more than one million pounds of food per week.

“So many of us feel helpless right now,” Williams-Paisley told the Tennessean. “There’s so many people, who aren’t on the front lines, who want to know what they can do to help. This feels like one of those things for us. We’re pouring a lot into this.”