Daily Table To Open In Salem's Point Neighborhood As Discount Nonprofit Grocery Model

SALEM, MA — A nonprofit grocery model that has brought discount nutritional food choices to underserved neighborhoods of Boston and Cambridge for the past decade is coming to Salem's Point neighborhood.

Daily Table, which offers prices between 20 and 30 percent less than average retailers with all items sold eligible to be covered with SNAP benefits, is set to open at 135 Lafayette Street on Sept. 8 with a ribbon-cutting event set for Sept. 9.

Chief Executive Officer Rob Twyman, a former Whole Foods executive, told Patch in a Friday interview that the mission of the company is to offer high-quality, nutritional food to urban populations not ideally served by grocery chain stores and to those looking for alternatives to food banks.

"We are right here in an area of Salem that is a lower-income neighborhood," he said. "We're right in the neighborhood that needs us. We are not on the edge of town. We are not in a place that requires a car to get to us even though we do have parking.

"We look to provide access to good food financially and geographically."

This is Daily Table's fifth store in Greater Boston with the others in Dorchester, Mattapan, Roxbury and Cambridge's Central Square.

The Salem location will sell a selection of items typical of any grocery store as well as well-balanced to-go meals for as low as $2.99 prepared at the Dorchester commissary.

"What we are trying to do is offer an affordable, convenient alternative to fast food," Twyman said. "If you've been to McDonald's in the last couple of years you know that not only is it not cheap anymore, it's not nutritious."

Twyman said the store's nonprofit model is based on covering two-thirds of costs through sales and the other one-third through corporate partnerships, private donations and government funding. He said that some food is donated but that most are acquired through working with mission-aligned suppliers who are able to get products to the stores at a lower price that Daily Table passes on to customers.

"Food insecurity is a problem that is not going away," said Twyman, noting that 6 of 10 area residents eligible for food banks do not utilize them. "Food banks are only parts of the solution.

"We are an alternative to the food banks in that we are a program that provides a sense of agency to our customers. We have customers coming into our stores and shopping in our stores with their own means then bringing those groceries back home to their families."

He added that other than a manager brought in from the Cambridge store "100 percent of the people we've hired for this store come directly from the Salem community."

The grand opening ceremony at 9 a.m. on Sept. 9 is set to include Lt. Gov. and former Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, Mayor Dominick Pangallo and Point Neighborhood Association President Lucy Corchado.

"We are super excited to welcome them," Twyman said, "and more importantly welcome the community into Daily Table to see everything we have to offer and start building relationships with the Salem community."

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)