Community rallies to keep Grocery Store open after Fire
By Beth Carlson
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MALVERN, Iowa (KETV) — It’s been five years since a fire destroyed Mulholland’s Grocery in Malvern, Iowa, an over 150-year-old family-run store.
Fourth-generation owner Tom Mulholland worked to reopen the store after three long years. But now, he says it’s a struggle to pay off the price tag of rebuilding. “Insurance was nowhere near enough,” Mulholland said. “I am in debt about $700,000 right now, and the store is having enough business doing enough that we would be okay if it wasn’t for those huge loan payments every month.”
During the years of rebuilding, the town and the surrounding area was left without a grocery store.
“It was an over 22-mile round trip to the closest grocery store. There were people that walked to this grocery store. There were people that ride electric scooters to this grocery store because that’s all they’ve got. So, it was a real hardship,” Mulholland said. At 66 years old, Mulholland works 65 hours a week to keep the store running. Then the community found out he was using his retirement savings to help pay off the rebuilding loans.
“I love my job, you know, that’s all by choice, but I’m trying to be there for the people that really depend on us,” Mulholland said. “In the time I’ve had my grocery store, within 45 miles, six communities have lost their only grocery store.”
An online fundraiser is trying to help pay off the loans. So far, it’s raised $38,000.
“There’s a lot of anonymous people on there. I see that a high school girlfriend donated $1,000. I mean, that really says something,” Mulholland said. Mulholland said he just wants to keep his family’s legacy alive and keep his hometown from becoming a food desert.
“I want to build this store to be strong enough so that someone else will want to take over, and there will still be a store here to take care of people for the next 20 or 30 years,” Mulholland said.
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