Today, we’d like to introduce you to Nicole Folkes-Johnson. Nicole was introduced to us by the brilliant and talented Kimberly Starks.
Hi Nicole , we’re so thrilled to have you sharing your story with us today. Maybe we can kick things off by having you introduce yourself to our readers? We’d love to have you go into your story and how you got to where you are today.
In March 2011 my husband and I both lost our jobs. We had a house, car, kid in private school and no way to pay our bills. My husband Donsha worked for a produce delivery company and I worked in advertising and he lost his job on a Friday afternoon. On Monday, we got a call from a daycare that was expecting their apples and milk from the now closed produce company. They couldn’t reach the owner so they called my husband. We went and delivered the order. And the company told us about all the other daycares that also needed their deliveries, so we did those too! And by the end of the week, we were able to purchase the owner’s truck. We didn’t know what we were doing. We weren’t even sure if this was what we wanted to do, but we were guided in this direction and it felt right.
We also started delivering baskets of fruit and vegetables to our neighbors and people we knew. It wasn’t to make money. We were now in the wholesale produce business and we figured we would eat properly during the recession and help our neighbors do the same. And then we delivered to a woman who worked for Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. And she took her delivery to work and we were invited to become a part of the Employee Wellness Program and host Farmers Markets at CHOA. Again, we weren’t sure what we were doing. We didn’t even know how. But it felt right. And before we knew it, we were setting up Farmers Markets at all the CHOA Locations, Piedmont Hospitals, WellStar Hospitals and Offices, Emory, Gwinnett Medical and even a few other companies that just called us. We got to the point where were were turning away work because there was no more room in the schedule! We started in 2011. By 2020 we had 43 Farmers Markets a month at 5 Hospital systems and we had never gone back to work for anyone else.
And then the Pandemic happened, and all of our markets went away. Every, last one. We worked in hospitals, so it made sense. We couldn’t be upset, and as we all thought, it would just be temporary. So we came up with another quick fix. We would set up a temporary delivery service in the interim. Just until the pandemic went away. And of course, that didn’t happen.
Our delivery service has been an amazing addition to our business as we found that we are able to help so many people who we would never have been able to see. People who lived in areas where we didn’t have Farmers Markets. People who live in Food deserts and who have no access to fresh fruit and vegetables. People who are shut in and cannot go outside because of age, disability or illness. Right now we feed over 500 families a week with our delivery service and our markets are coming back, so we’re in a good place.
Please tell us more about your brand, Eat Right Atlanta
We’re a business that operates with a mission : to do good every day. We sell fruit & vegetables at a reasonable price (much more affordable than the supermarket) but it’s all done with the idea that we’re here to help. We focus on food deserts and places where people don’t have access to fresh produce and nutritious food and we go to them. It should not be a privilege to get healthy and fresh food. That should be a right of everyone. But not everyone has access. Not everyone has the money. No everyone knows how to cook a healthy meal. So we help with all of that. If people call and don’t have the money to pay for the food they need, we have a fund that allows us to feed them. We also partner with a local organization called My Style Matters and provide boxes of fresh produce to women undergoing treatment for breast cancer. We’re proud of the work we do every day, but that partnership is extremely special to us. We also partnered with the Tau Epsilon Omega Chapter of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority last year to provide boxes of fresh fruit and vegetables to families of schoolchildren who don’t have food to eat on the weekends. Many children rely on school breakfast and lunch for their meals and when the weekend comes around, they don’t have anything to eat. So with Alpha Kappa Alpha’s program, we were able to feed schoolchildren and their families from a school in East Point, GA
Blue Scorpion Reputation Management has been a great friend to us and I know you’ve got a great relationship as well. Maybe you can tell our audience a bit about Blue Scorpion Reputation Management and your experience with them.
Kimberly is an angel! And we really mean that! She’s getting the word out about what we’re doing, and most importantly she’s helping us see what can be possible. She’s become a partner in all of this, because she believes in the work we’re doing and is doing so much to help us succeed
Website: eatrightatlanta.com
Instagram: @eatrightatlanta
Twitter: eatrightatlanta
Facebook: Eat Right Atlanta Food Coop
Yelp: eatrightatlanta
