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(lighthearted music) (lighthearted music) - Welcome to "Business Forward."

I'm your host Matt George.

Joining me tonight, Pastor Chuck Brown.

Chuck is the founder and senior pastor at Victory Christian Church.

Welcome.

- Hey, Matt.

(laughing) Thank you.

- I appreciate.

I appreciate you comin' on.

I mean, there's a lot to talk about, and, you know, before the show started, we just talked about our community.

And we have, I was just saying to you, I think it's everybody's duty to take care of the community that they live in, and, you know, there is no race when it comes to taking care of community.

It's about people.

And I think, you know, there's just so many issues right now within every community across the United States, and one of 'em we're gonna talk about that you're gonna help solve, and I love to talk about that.

But first of all, how did you, have you grown up in Peoria?

Did you, are you from here?

- Well, first of all, thank you for havin' me as well.

Yeah, a combination of Peoria.

I was actually born in Chicago.

My first home was Caprini-Green Projects.

(laughing) - So you were born?

- In Chicago, the youngest of 10.

And my parents, you know, obviously migrated in this area, and so we came to Peoria, left once, lived in Kankakee for a little while, a little country town.

So, I tell people all the time, I was born in the projects of Chicago and then the little country town of Kankakee before coming to Peoria so I'm both ghetto and country.

(both laughing) - So, how long have you lived here?

- Most of my life though.

We came here.

I'm a graduate of Manuel High School.

Actually attended McKinley before we left and went to Kankakee and then came back to and I graduated from Manuel High School.

I can't tell you the year because then you'll know, realize I'm almost a hundred.

So, prior to South Side, Manuel High School.

- That is great.

That is great.

So, I know you've done so many great things, and you do have community in mind.

You have people in mind, but, you know, one of the things I do remember you from is these job fairs that you had done in the past.

And talk about that.

I mean, what made you get into that piece of, just from the need from the church, or how did you come about that?

- Well, you know, I guess first and foremost, to me as a community church, you know, when we started Victory over 10 years ago, one of the first things I wanted to do was connect our efforts in the community to help people.

We didn't want to just be a church inside the walls, but we wanted to help people meet the essential services, and there are several churches that do food pantries.

Then, you have the Dream Center, which Pastor King founded, an incredible leader.

And so, churches are, they find that niche, that area where God wants them to be planted, and they help the community within that area.

In our case, you know, God put it in my heart to help connect people with employment opportunities.

So, without any real knowledge, I just reached, started reaching out to employers and organized our first job fair.

At that time, we were at 603 West Nebraska, and we had the event down in the fellowship hall, and over 200 people showed up.

- [Matt] Wow.

- And I said, hey, I'm pretty good at this.

So, we tried it, and it eventually grew, exploded.

We've had events as large as the Civic Center.

Our largest job fair, I believe, was in 2015.

We had well over 2000 applicants comin' in the door.

So, we have continued to build that relationship with over 100 companies in the area.

It's a great asset for the human resource people, but, moreover, it's an amazing opportunity for people lookin' for jobs.

- Are you seeing from a business standpoint, 'cause you know, I interview a lot of small business owners, and you hear it all over the country that it's just hard to hire people right now.

And I think some people think, how is that?

If there's so many different job openings, why is it so hard to hire?

- Well, I guess a lot of the companies, in their defense, technology.

There are different skill sets that are required to perform most job career opportunities, and some of the people that are seeking employment are lacking some of those essential skills that help make the company work.

But there are great partners that also attend our job fairs, like Illinois Central College.

Even in the past, we worked with Mid-State College several years ago, and then you've got MTI.

So, we try to partner with our urban leagues and different organizations to be a part of it.

So, they're really job and resource fairs, and what that does is it just helps to bring that, those relationships together, not only with just the job seekers and the employers but also with resource providers to help that skill set, the training necessary so.

But it's still gonna be a, it's a challenge nationwide as far as unemployment.

You know, we have our share here in Peoria, but I think we've been doin' a pretty good job of makin' relationships.

Well over a thousand people every year go to our events.

- Yeah, I had Denise Moore on with the, the resource center that she has, Minority Development Resource Center.

And, you know, you're talkin' about, you brought up technology, and that was one of the discussion points we had is if people, people wanna learn, but how do you get people into you know, opportunities, I guess, so to speak?

So, you know, I think there's.

You've got the Junior Achievement, and you have what she's doing.

You have what you're doing.

And if there's some sort of collaboration, we actually could grow business.

And I think if you think about you for an example.

Like, I know you're not a guy to take credit for it, but think about the lives you've changed just by someone being employed.

Isn't that crazy?

- It, you know, it was one of the things that my late wife, she used to come and help me do the events.

It was one of the things we looked forward to was that that smile on their face when they come in.

It's like, you never think about that, what you just said, but the fact is, is you're opening the door for someone to have an incredible opportunity with an Ameren or a Caterpillar or an OSF.

And there were times young people would come, and they weren't ready, you know, or they didn't have a shirt and tie on.

So, we kept a box of ties around the corner.

We'd be like, come here.

Run into the bathroom and straighten up your hair, okay?

Put this tie on.

It looks a little more presentable.

One young lady, we sent her home.

She did not get offended.

We said, "We need you to go change and come back here."

She said, "I know."

Where's your address?

We're comin' to get you if you don't come back.

Sure enough, she came back, and she was able to land an amazing career with Caterpillar.

So, it's really about exposure.

These events expose people to opportunities, and for these great companies, it exposes the opportunity.

And so, it's just makin' those connections.

- I mean, think about the psychological safety piece of being employed.

- [Pastor Brown] Yes, amen.

(laughing) - I mean, that's is about as important as it gets.

- And then Denise Moore, her main focus is with the small business development.

She's doin' just, she has done an absolute incredible job.

Even been, she's been very instrumental in helping me even with the project that I'm workin' on now.

- Good, I, that's what I was, I didn't know if there was a connection or a few.

- [Pastor Brown] Yes.

- Yeah, and I think that there's a lot of people that wanna see good.

- I believe that.

I think, I was able to do a training program for Andrew Rand.

He's the CEO of.

- AMT.

- AMT and so I trained 163 of his team.

And it was really a focus on diversity, and this program was called Timeout.

And what we'll realize is, we may seem divided.

I'm not sure when we've all been on one accord.

It's not even America, but at the end of the day, most people have the same desires and needs and goals.

And so what we did in that training program, we came to the conclusion that we have more in common than we have different.

- Yeah, I wasn't gonna go down this route, but I think I'll bring it up.

I always say that people don't really understand the true meaning of collaboration.

- [Pastor Brown] Right.

- I think people use the term a lot, but I don't think they do it.

- No, it's easier to be in your comfort zone.

Most people would prefer to be around like minds or people that grew up the same, or same culture, or same environment, but that's limiting yourself, and it also limits your opportunities.

- Yeah, all right.

This is the topic I can't wait to talk about.

It's on your shirt.

Let's go right into it.

Harvest Market and Grill.

Tell me about it.

- Well, one of the things, I gotta tell it all.

- [Matt] I want you to.

- When I decided to run for mayor, (laughing).

- [Matt] Yeah.

- It was this seven-step vision that God gave me that involved employment, community development, business development, and there were these bullet points that was a part of this itinerary.

Well, you know, obviously we've elected an amazing mayor, and, but the vision is still there.

And Harvest is part of a larger vision.

And there's an area, there's a couple of areas of our community that I feel is struggling.

One, particularly the South Side where I grew up has been struggling economically.

It is a, there's lots of challenges, and then there's a counterculture that is creating a very toxic environment in a neighborhood with some incredible, incredible people.

And so, the agenda for Harvest, obviously, is to bring the essential service and product that people truly deserve, and a supermarket is what's missing.

And so to me, with entrepreneur experience and as a business owner, you have to find a need and meet it, but this supermarket gives us this opportunity to create a staple in the community and put us in the direction of changing the narrative of the community.

- I like the word deserves.

It's true.

So, where's the building located?

- We are in, we're 210 South Western Avenue.

We're in the old Aldi's.

Aldi's were there.

They built that store.

Man, did they build it solid, and they were there for several years.

Their business model, they made some commitments in their business model, which is why they left the area.

The Save-A-Lot came in a couple of years later through Denise Moore's leadership and attracting that supermarket, but they didn't last a year.

And so, that left the community in addition to Kroger's Madison Park leaving as well as CVS.

You know, a lot of those major chains leavin' the area.

There is a reason why they left the area.

- [Matt] What's the reason?

- Well, food desert communities, there's a combination of challenges, and the biggest challenge that most people would probably have to accept the reality is stores deal with what's called shrink.

Shrink leads to heightened security.

Shrink involves your items goin' bad.

You have to get rid of as a supermarket owner.

You can only keep somethin' on the shelf so long.

But then, items comin' up missin', or you have crime in a specific area, and it's just a reality.

Supermarkets are only earning 1 cent, one to 3 cents on the dollar.

So, food desert stores are usually losing 4 cents on the dollar, and they're able to stay in a community only for so long, and they depend on public and private funding to help mitigate that gap to keep 'em out of the red.

And so, those stores are not coming back.

- Yeah, which is sad.

- Yeah, it's not good.

It's bad for the community because food deserts, there is a higher rate of obesity, diabetes.

The death rate is 50% higher in food desert communities because there's no fresh and affordable produce and healthy food choices.

And so, it just kind of leaves the neighborhood dry for the most part.

- I think people hear the term food desert.

I don't think they really know exactly, not all people, but some people don't know what it means.

And so, and what you just said just is the byproduct of not having access because it takes somebody, I'm just gonna give an example.

Take somebody who's 80 years old and has no transportation, and there's a grocery store that's two blocks away.

They can figure it out.

They can have people help them.

They can do this.

If you don't have a grocery store within three miles, what are you gonna do?

And then there's gas stations, and gas stations sell a lot of chips.

And they sell a lot of Mountain Dew and things like that.

And so they do, a lot of people do not have access like you said, to greens, fruits, all of that.

And it does lead to medical issues, and it goes back to my point of bigger picture of what a community is.

You can't have a piece of the community struggle while it's okay over here.

It's, it's, I like the word deserves.

I think you said it perfectly.

- Well, Harvest, our goal is to provide fresh, affordable and nutritional food to the community.

One of the challenges with food deserts, particularly in my area, is Dollar stores proliferate food desert communities.

And again, this is no insult to their business model, but unfortunately the majority of what they are going to carry is processed food with longer shelf life.

And that's not gonna be good for the benefit of the community.

But the other challenge is within that food desert, let me just kind of, you know, give a little bit of a description of what they consider a food desert.

That's when the majority of the neighborhood is at least a mile away from.

- I did not know that.

- A supermarket in urban communities, but in rural areas at least 10 miles.

And so, there are over 2 million people affected by food, who live in food deserts, just in the state of Illinois, and I believe there's approximately 53.6 million livin' in food deserts across the country, and so.

- [Matt] Say the stat again for Illinois.

What was it?

- It's at well over 2 million people that actually live in food deserts.

- Oh my goodness.

- In the state of Illinois, and so it is a challenge.

The other issue is when they, when you look at it statistically, food deserts, 80% of the residents are people of color.

And so, in addition to heart disease and diabetes and different things, cancers, and things that we are challenged with, it increases the problem.

And so, by bringing Harvest to the South Side, which is just an exciting project, exciting store.

- I'm excited for you.

- You know, we wanna become that staple in the community more than just that supermarket, but we wanna give away apples and hope.

We want to provide a place where people can be seen and heard, feel safe, where they can gather, you know.

We've got the food court inside, which we'll talk a little bit more about that, but we've got a place where people can congregate and get to know your neighbor.

Be a part of the community.

- Almost like a community center that is a restaurant/cafe/grocery store.

- Yes, well, the cafe is gonna put a few pounds on me.

(laughing) - Let's talk about it.

I know, well, I'm reading it.

I mean, it has, you have a area for drinks and coffee, but, I mean, you're servin' all kinds of great food.

- It's 30 seats that we're gonna have in the cafe.

We're very excited about it.

The Grill, pardon me, which it will have Brown Coffee and Cream where you can get, you know, obviously coffee products.

In Brown Coffee and Cream, we will have a waffle you can get in the mornings.

It'll, you can get it with eggs or bacon.

That's eggs, bacon, sausage.

- [Matt] I love it, love it.

- And they're delicious, but it's the one you can get with smoked turkey as well.

So, but then also we'll have the Chicken and Turkey Hut, which will feature our world-class smoked turkey legs.

- I, that's what I was gonna ask you about because I, when I saw the picture, I was like, okay, I could eat that probably at any time during the day.

- Well, I wish I could say I'm original, but we were in Texas a few years ago, and we we were fortunate to go to a Turkey Leg Hut down there.

And it's like two hours to get in the restaurant, two-hour line.

- I love it.

- Just great environment, and so I never forgot that.

And I came home and worked on that recipe.

So these turkey legs are, they taste like ham.

They fall off the bone.

You eat 'em with a fork.

- I can dig that.

- You can get 'em stuffed with shrimp alfredo ragin' Cajun mac and cheese, or bayou dirty rice.

So it's gonna be great.

- So, I heard an interview and so you said you don't need.

We're not gonna offer 15 types of ketchup.

We're gonna offer two.

- [Pastor Brown] Right.

- And so, explain the concept of the grocery area.

- Well, in the supermarket, you, there's a grocery store, and then there's a supermarket.

You have to do over $2 million to be qualified as a supermarket.

So, our projections, we're figurin' at least four to five million for our first year.

And the food selection, the choice between a Kroger's and an Aldi's.

Kroger's, you can get maybe 35,000 different products.

Aldi's, they're only gonna carry 1400 essential products.

- [Matt] Okay, I did not know that.

- And they can, in addition to their own supplies, you know, their own brands, they can buy in bulk.

And that's how stores like Aldi's and Save-A-Lot are able to pass those savings to the customer.

It also, in our case, we're gonna model after Aldi's.

We're just going to carry the essentials.

So, you won't have 15 to 20 different ketchups, which also leads to buyer fatigue.

With Aldi's, you can get in, you can get out.

Wey'll say with Harvest, we'll have that same supply but in addition, we are going to canvas the neighborhood and find out what's important to the people.

- Yeah, so that's one of your initiatives actually is to, the larger vision is to talk to people and help revitalize the community.

- Absolutely.

- And you're gonna be providing jobs too.

That's what people forget.

- We're here to serve people.

- Yeah.

- Harvest is, our mission once again is to provide apples and hope.

We're here to serve that community.

So, in addition to our supermarket, finding out what's important to people in the community, what other products we have.

In addition to an African American population, we have a growing Latino population.

We have a very diverse white, black, Latino community, and by providing that essential service to them, we'll help to nourish them and provide what's important without them having to go all the way over the bridge or way out on the Lake.

But again, because Harvest is part of a larger vision, you know, with something you were touching on, what we look to reinvest back in the community.

- I wanna read somethin'.

"Our store's mission is to reduce barriers "for community residents of South Peoria "to access fresh fruits and vegetables, "but our heart reaches so much further "than just a grocery store.

"We provide a wonderful place where people "can be seen, heard, and feel safe."

That's beautifully written.

- Absolutely.

That's def, that is our main objective is to become that staple in the community.

There'll be several things goin' on at Harvest.

You might have a, you know, farmers' markets running through the summer.

You might see family roller skating night one night when the store closes.

You may see, we're gonna partner with the police department again.

There's gonna be a big community-wide festival in our parking lot in August, and so.

- [Matt] Make sure I get the invite.

- Yeah.

(laughing) - I can't wait.

- You gotta come.

Last year we did it, you know, even though we're not open yet.

You know, we still immediately our goal again is to serve people.

We want to make that immediate connection, and so the Chief of Police and Peoria Police Department, and we partnered with them.

And we had vendors.

We had bounce houses.

We gave away supplies for kids and free hot dogs.

It was just amazing.

- [Matt] That's awesome.

- And so we're lookin' to double it up this year.

- When do you open?

- Well, we're gonna open in two phases because this is very difficult.

This is very hard financing a project of this magnitude.

It's, you're looking at a building that had nothing in it, and so we're looking at a half million dollars in just refrigeration alone, just to get that in.

And so, we're gonna open in two phases, the food court being first, and once we get that food court open, the supermarket within three to six months following.

And that is our goal.

And we have to do that based on my ability to finance and get things done, but we're hoping our projection as far as getting the food court itself open, we're in there getting that built out now as we speak.

And so, our goal is to have it open before the end of the summer so.

- [Matt] Good, good.

- Hopefully we don't run into any supply chain issues as far as equipment.

I don't foresee that so we should be good.

- You know what's interesting is you probably, six months ago or 12 months ago, that was probably the hiccup.

- [Pastor Brown] Yes.

(laughing) - But now, you're probably in a different spot.

So, how do you get the word out besides bein' on this show?

I mean, we need to get the word out.

People need to know what's the positive things that are happening in town.

- It comes down to, again, when you touch the life of one person, they're gonna tell other people about it.

And I can't go anywhere, Walmart, Kroger's, the gas station, when is the store gonna open?

No matter where I am, and that to me is very exciting.

It doesn't make me feel bad.

It just makes me feel excited that people are talking, and, I mean, every race, every culture is just exciting.

They're excited about it, and they're lookin' forward to it.

And so, we're gonna, you know, social media's definitely helped.

This helps.

So, we're gonna be pretty good here.

- Yeah, I see you've got a strong social media presence, and hopefully this does help because I think we need to support this great idea.

Just quickly, how did the idea come about?

Did you, have you always wanted to do somethin' like this?

- Absolutely not.

(laughing) - [Matt] I wondered, yeah.

- Yeah, I like shoppin' in grocery stores, but, you know, and as far as we have access to information today now faster than the speed of light.

What's helping me with the supermarket project, our food supplier.

I have consultants.

I have attorneys that, you know, we, you have to surround yourself with people that know and understand.

- [Matt] Right, you have to put a good team around you.

- [Pastor Brown] Yes.

- Well, I just wanna thank you for comin' on, Pastor Chuck Brown.

This is so great.

I love that you came on, and you're doin' great work.

Keep it up, and if you need anything from us, we'll help.

I'm Matt George, and this is another episode of "Business Forward."

(lighthearted music) - Thanks for tuning into "Business Forward," brought to you by PNC.

PNC Bank National Association, member FDIC.

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