Residents rally to rebuild grocery store in Dighton

When a suspicious fire destroyed her hometown's only grocery store in January 2024, Marjory James felt a loss of independence.

Like other residents of her rural west Kansas town, James — who turns 99 years old on July 7 — faced a harsh reality: Travel 23 miles one-way from Dighton to the grocery store in Scott City, or get by with less-healthy and less-available items from the local variety store or gas station.

"Going to other places to shop means travel, or family having to help me, and not something that is easy for anyone," said James, who until recently still did her own shopping, cooking and meal planning.

"For sure, traveling to a nearby town was not something I could do by myself anymore. Being able to go just a few blocks to get what I needed is so good. The weather doesn't allow travel elsewhere. Just getting to the local store when we have snow or ice can be tough."

Through a gargantuan effort by the community, Dighton will open an 8,000-square foot grocery store on June 27, spurred by the Lane County Community Foundation and with assistance from the Kansas Healthy Food Initiative and Kansas State University's Rural Grocery Initiative.

K-State provides 'backbone support' to bring grocery store back to Lane County

The Lane County Community Grocery will operate under a seven-member board of directors, and residents can donate to support the store through the county's community foundation, which purchases stock and dividends in the store.

"We knew the minute the store burned down in 2024 that the only way a grocery store would ever exist in Lane County was if there was a non-profit involved, because of exorbitant construction and equipment costs," said Casey Venters, executive director of the Lane County Community Foundation.

Since the previous store burned, Venters has led an effort to raise more than $500,000 from donations and public grants, including a pre-development technical assistance grant from the Kansas Healthy Food Initiative to pay for architectural, engineering and attorney costs.

The Kansas Healthy Food Initiative is a partnership between the Kansas Health Foundation, K-State Extension's Rural Grocery Initiative, Network Kansas, IFF — a community development financial institution — and the Food Trust.

"When the grocery store burned down and the community was uncertain about next steps, the local extension office connected residents to our team of statewide specialists with expertise in rural grocery," said Rial Carver, program manager for the Rural Grocery Initiative.

"While credit for this project goes to the determination of local residents, K-State Extension and the Rural Grocery Initiative provided backbone support along the way to ensure the Lane County Community Grocery store was set on a path toward success."

Venters echoed Carver's sentiments, noting that university groups helped the foundation navigate licensing and regulatory requirements through such tools as the Kansas Department of Agriculture's Grocery and Retail Store Licensing Guide. Venters also joined a Rural Grocery Initiative-facilitated peer group to discuss case studies, learn from other rural grocers, and gain access to webinars and ongoing support.

"It's really awesome to have those resources," Venters said. "You go to a website and what you need to know is all spelled out for you. They continue to produce a monthly newsletter that has stories in it that are inspiring about what other towns are doing."

"Knowing that they are here to help is a security blanket, and it's hugely important. We don't necessarily need them for anything right now, but that might change in the future. Knowing that they're there is great."

Community organizations stepped in to provide support in the interim

During the time that Dighton residents have been without a grocery store, Venters said many organizations, including churches, stepped up. Local groups offered bus rides to Scott City for grocery shopping; residents could place online orders for others to pick up for them.

But Venters noted a big breakthrough came when local businessman Randy Evans — who owned the local meat locker — approached him with an idea.

"He said, 'Why don't we use my meat locker and do something in the short term, so we can spend our time figuring out the correct long-term solution,'" Venters said.

For more than two years, Evans drove his refrigerated box truck each Monday and Thursday to Jetmore, Kansas — 104 miles round-trip — to stock food for the local community.

"He turned his seasonal fruit business and walk-in cooler into a small market store," Venters said, "and it had everything: produce, meat, dairy, cheese, bread and more. It was the right thing that we needed to get by, along with food items available from the local variety store, to form a bridge."

Vickie James, a registered dietitian in Riley County, had a rooting interest in Dighton's efforts to rebuild its grocery store: Not only is she a native of the town who has stayed connected to the community, but she's also the daughter-in-law of Marjory James.

"A local grocery store is much more than a place to buy food; it is essential infrastructure that helps keep a town healthy, energized and economically strong," Vickie James said. "Without convenient access to a grocery store, residents face limited availability of healthy foods, fewer choices and less variety — making it more difficult to meet nutritional needs and enjoy a balanced diet."

Evans, who previously owned a grocery store in Delta, Colorado, serves as vice chairman of the newly formed Lane County Community Grocery board of directors, and is helping to train the Dighton store's employees.

"There's a three-legged stool that every community must stand on," Venters said. "There's the school system, a hospital and grocery. Everything else is auxiliary to that. Once you lose one of the legs of the stool, it's literally 'See you later' for the community."

Marjory James agrees with the importance of a grocery store: "We need a store here. Families go through so much food and the basics are important. Fruits, vegetables, milk, meats … you can't run out of town every few days to pick those up. It makes it so much easier to have healthy foods."

"But having a grocery store in town means money is spent here. A store adds jobs, and the biggest thing is, as a small town, it keeps us going."