Some of the state’s biggest food lovers gathered in a sunny classroom at Hope & Main Friday afternoon to celebrate the food incubator’s growing successes, and announce a coup: a …
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Some of the state’s biggest food lovers gathered in a sunny classroom at Hope & Main Friday afternoon to celebrate the food incubator’s growing successes, and announce a coup: a $178,000 federal grant secured by Sen. Jack Reed that should help the non-profit train more food service professionals across southeastern New England.
The $178,000 grant, given by the USDA’s Farmers Market Promotion Program, will be given over three years. It will be put to use to support distribution partnerships with Farm Fresh Rhode Island, with the end goal of reaching retail and institutional buyers.
It will also help support branding and marketing education for Hope & Main members, and will help expand access to local food at Hope&Main’s Schoolyard and Meet Your Maker markets.
Lisa Raiola, who founded Hope&Main, stood alongside Sen. Reed as the grant was announced, and told the dozens of guests in the audience that few thought Hope&Main would come so far, or do so much, in its first four years. But Sen. Reed, she said, always believed:
“When you’re starting something new, you never forget the first person to believe in you,” she said. Sen. Reed “so believed in us that he championed this idea all the way to Washington, DC.
“We remain grateful to Sen. Reed for his good advocacy and his unwavering confidence in our ability to achieve that original vision on behalf of men and women of all means … whose dream it is to launch and grow a sustainable food business,” she said. “It doesn’t hurt that every time he comes here, those same men and women give him snacks.”