Bradford’s only grocery store burns down, raising concerns about a food shortage

Bradford, Arkansas – Although you can get anything you could possibly need or want at the grocery shop, residents of Bradford are now concerned that the town may become a food desert after the town’s sole food center caught fire over the weekend.

The Bradford Hometown Food Center caught fire after a burst of flames followed by smoke spilling out of the kitchen.

“We get a phone call around 3:43 a.m. Saturday that it’s on fire,” owner Scott McCall said.

Five years ago, the McCalls purchased the business from the owner because Leveta McCall couldn’t allow it to close.

The McCalls claimed that despite being boarded up and with the letters melted off, many people still travel there to buy their weekly supplies.

“What do we do now, what do our employees do now? We had a good group of employees,” Leveta McCall said.

However, Scott McCall claimed that the dread of how much this will affect the town is an even worse phobia.

“We are now a food desert, it’s going to be very difficult for a lot of people to get good food, I don’t know when and how we can fix it, and we are evaluating all of that as we speak,” Scott McCall said.

The distance between Bradford and its surrounding areas and the nearest place for affordable, wholesome food might cause a community to become a “food desert.”

“There is a lot of research that shows that towns that don’t have grocery stores begin to fade away,” McCall stated. “A town without a grocery store doesn’t have much of a future.”

In an effort to put the pieces back together, the McCall family and their staff have convened.

“Today reality set in, this morning… what’s going to go on,” Leveta McCall said.

They declared that they will advance piece by piece and board by board while fully relying on their faith.

“We believe that God’s got a plan, we believe in that, and we have people praying and we are going to know when the time is right, what to do, He will take care of that,” Leveta McCall said.

The Bradford incident Department said that they are still looking into the actual cause of the incident.