When Sissie Lang was a child, she remembers seeing wild hogs on what’s now Camp Creek Parkway. In the ‘70s, white flight drove most of Lang’s neighbors out of East Point. The MARTA train station didn’t yet exist in the area. Yet Lang can also remember a time when residents benefitted from both a Winn-Dixie and an A&P (Atlantic & Pacific) where they could grocery shop. “It was just very, very different,” she says. 

Today, the city boasts nearly 39,000 residents, roughly the same amount that it did back then. But, the racial demographics have changed significantly. Whereas in 1970 white people made up more than 90 percent of residents, they currently comprise roughly 9 percent of the city’s population. In contrast, Black residents currently account for about 75 percent of East Point, and, at 10 percent, there’s also a growing Hispanic population.

Despite maintaining the same population size, East Point has struggled to maintain food access. Currently, Wayfield is the only traditional grocery store that exists within city limits despite ongoing efforts to attract others. 

Some residents believe this is linked to the changing demographics of the area. 

“If we want to get historical, we’re suffering from the vestiges of redlining and disinvestment, all of that stuff,” says Opal Baker, an owner and a board member of Market 166, a co-op in the works that would serve Tri-Cities residents. “Those big chain grocery stores definitely were not moving here because they did not believe that we had the economic base to support their store. And, that’s based on a lot of stuff that has nothing to do with the community itself.” 

Still, Maceo Rogers, East Point’s director of economic development, points to the Kroger on Metropolitan Parkway (three miles outside East Point, requiring a 10-minute car ride or 15-minute bike ride), as well as the Publix on Camp Creek Parkway (five miles outside city limits, requiring a 15-minute car or bus ride) as nearby grocery stores. He also wonders whether residents without transportation are as inconvenienced, when “they can Doordash” their groceries. 

“It’s not like we don’t have access, but we just don’t have it within our city limits,” Rogers says. 

Still, in recent years, residents have repeatedly asked questions regarding why the city has struggled to entice new grocery stores to the area, and why the existing options seem less desirable than stores in other parts of metro Atlanta. 

“I often get questions about this, and I say the staff is working relentlessly on this matter through the course of several years,” Mayor Deana Holiday Ingraham said during a East Point City Council Work session in 2020. 

As these questions remain unanswered, and larger solutions remain out of reach, community members have worked to feed themselves and their neighbors instead. 

Rogers says even the few grocery stores that do exist in East Point could use some updates, both in terms of their visual appeal and overall customer experience. “It could be something as simple as giving a building or a strip center a complete fresh paint job, maybe changing out the windows, maybe changing out the overhead awnings, [or] things like that.”

That seemed to be what Wayfield Foods was doing in 2022, when the Georgia-based retailer transformed its College Park location into its second ever Eden Fresh Market. Wayfield Foods CEO Ron Edenfield told The Shelby Report that such stores were designed to offer natural and organic options that might appeal to younger customers. 

Two years later, reviews of Eden Fresh Market by Tri-Cities community members remain mixed. 

“It took me a while to get there because I wasn’t buying it, it had the name Wayfield on it,” Baker says. “By the time I got there, it looked just like all the other Wayfields that I’d been in. The produce was wilted. They put some pretty fancy packaging on some of the stuff, but it was still all of the same sugar-filled and salt-filled processed foods.” 

“It’s like when you’ve got your hair color all your life, and then all of a sudden you just go and you make yourself a blonde because you just want to look different,” Lang says. 

Still, Lang says some products at the store are “better,” with seemingly more locally-sourced options than the ones that existed previously. Wayfield, she says, also deserves a “pat on the back” for remaining in the area even when other retailers wouldn’t. 

Rogers says the city is constantly engaging in efforts to bring more grocery stores to the area. In recent years, he says, the city of East Point has had conversations and neighborhood tours with various companies, including Aldi, Sprouts, Publix, Lidl, Whole Foods, and Kroger. “It’s been productive in [engaging the companies], we’ve just not necessarily landed a major player that we so desire. We’re continuing to work on that,” he says. 

Rogers says low profit margins are partially to blame for the cautious nature of grocery retailers when it comes to expanding to new locations: “They’re very particular about the decision-making that goes into what location they’re going to expand in.”

Grocery retailers often consider neighborhoods with dense populations and discretionary income as desirable locations for their franchises. According to U.S. Census data, roughly 40 percent of residents in East Point are homeowners and the median household income is $56,618. Roughly 20 percent of East Point residents live in poverty, compared to roughly 12 percent of all Fulton County residents.

In other metro Atlanta neighborhoods, prospective retailers have also considered factors such as traffic counts. This would explain why Cascade Heights has been able to attract grocery stores such as Publix, Kroger and Walmart near Interstate 285. When Aldi revealed plans to open a grocery store in the same neighborhood, a NPU-I committee member said the retailer’s business model often relied on opening stores in areas where there was already an “anchor” grocery store. Rogers says he’s heard similar sentiments during discussions with Aldi and Lidl.

Jerry Shannon is an associate professor at the University of Georgia departments of geography and the financial planning, housing and consumer economics. He has used the term “supermarket redlining” to describe “how the locational decisions of food retailers are evidence of intentional disinvestment in low-income neighborhoods and communities of color.” 

“Supermarkets were created with suburban residents in mind, and so the forces that created the suburbs also shaped our food shopping options,” Shannon wrote in a 2018 Atlanta Studies report.

A 2023 Emory University study finds that “distance to grocery stores” and “a lack of transportation” remain commonly cited barriers to fresh produce. That’s despite how rideshare app Lyft previously attempted to address access to grocery stores with an initiative that provided hundreds of high-need residents in food deserts with up to eight subsidized rides per month.

According to the same Emory University study, 75 percent of residents lived within a half-mile of fresh produce in 2020, an increase from 52 percent in 2015. 

“Most of the expansion has been achieved via residents gaining access through new neighborhood markets, grocery stores, and farmer’s markets,” the report stated. 

Both Baker and Lang have helped create alternative solutions to fresh produce and groceries in East Point. 

In 2011, Lang launched the East Point Farmers Market, which doubles SNAP benefits for shoppers and was originally open Saturdays from August through November, although hours have since shifted to Wednesdays.

Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, about 20 vendors participated and more than 150 people would visit the volunteer-run farmers market each week. When Canopy Atlanta visited the market in August, less than 10 vendors remained, selling locally-grown peaches, peppers, tomatoes, corn, and more. (Lang anticipates that more vendors will join ahead of and during the holiday season.)

Lang says foot traffic has dwindled significantly, with roughly 50 people attending each week. She attributes the low turnout to competing events and the fact that the farmers market has often had to change locations on East Point Street, likely confusing attendees. The farmers market currently alternates between operating outside City Hall and setting up across the street next to the former fire station. Lang says she’d love to see more City Hall employees come out and utilize the resource that’s often within walking distance from their office.

One former vendor of the East Point Farmers Market is the group of local residents behind the co-op Market 166. East Point residents began organizing around the idea of launching a cooperative grocery store in 2017. Today, there are more than 400 members/owners involved with the initiative. 

Abby Tennenbaum, who chairs the board for Market 166, says the local group currently follows a guide set by the Food Co-Op Initiative (FCI), which recommends that stores have roughly 1,000 members before opening. Tennenbaum has noticed that most of the co-ops that have opened nationally in recent years take at least a decade of planning beforehand.

For now, Market 166 will soon sell a small amount of locally sourced products at Atlanta Utility Works. The board will focus on business planning, fundraising, getting community buy-in, and working with volunteers. 

Plans to find a permanent location and open Market 166 are “moving at the speed of trust,” Baker says. The perk to this, however, is that the grocery store can be more adaptable to community needs than a traditional retailer would be. 

“When you’re doing anything that is all about collaboration and cooperation, it just takes longer,” Tennenbaum says. “Building consensus [and] building understanding takes a long time. And it takes a lot of energy. But that’s how you move forward in a way where the majority of people involved have not only been involved but feel good about it, will support it, and have been a part of it.” 

Lovey Gilliam used to sell fresh produce at the East Point Farmers Market in 2015. In 2021, she pitched the idea for a brick and mortar store, Leafy Greens Market, to the American Heart Association and received a $125,000 grant. 

Originally, Gilliam launched with products from local vendors and Georgia’s first-ever hydroponic lettuce at retail, which she cut fresh-to-order for customers inside the store, though she struggled to set prices that work for both her and vendors. 

Since then, she has found many of her customers enjoy the ready-made meals she sells. 

“This has really turned into a health market where you can get vegan food, where you can get teas, and then you can get alkaline fruits and vegetables,” she says, noting that most of her customers come from Midtown and other parts of Atlanta, not East Point. 

Rogers is in the process of an “aggressive initiative,” featuring a strategic marketing plan, to continue engaging grocery retailers. “We’re continually reaching out,” he says.

Meanwhile, the owners of Market 166 say that recent discussions with community members shows that they desire a place that will give them access to food, but also community connection. 

“We get asked the question sometimes: Well, if a grocery store opens up, will that make you irrelevant?” Tennenbaum adds. “No. Absolutely not.”

Editor: Christina Lee

Fact Checker: Muriel Vega

Canopy Atlanta Reader: Kamille D. Whittaker

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