New Partner - Gulf Coast Diner

New Partner in Carrabelle

We delivered over 10,000 meals with our former partner in Carrabelle, FL and their team of volunteers paved the way for a very successful effort there.  With over 180 deliveries a week, there were many families that relied on and looked forward to the weekly visit from their Aaron Meals volunteer.  When our restaurant partner closed, those people were suddenly without meals or weekly check in visits.

New Start

Our existing volunteer team were all still eager to continue the deliveries and visits, so we set about looking for a new restaurant partner.  Sadly, we weren’t having much success and had decided to postpone the search until after the holidays.  That’s when we got a call from Tracy “Chase” Chism who was taking over the old location and opening a new restaurant, The Gulf Coast Diner.  With help from the original team leaders, Chase applied her energy and enthusiasm to help the community to not only get a new restaurant open while welcoming a new grand baby, but to also meet her goal of delivering meals before Christmas.  

Chase Delivers the first meals personally!

They intended to start small with 25 meals the first week, and grow a bit each week, but Chase called after the first week of deliveries to let us know that they had delivered 49 or nearly double the number of meals planned.  The emotion was clear in her voice as she related, “We’d deliver meals and the people were just so happy to see us!  They would tell us how much the meals meant to them and ask us to make sure another family who really relies on the meals was going to get them also…so we’d go back and make more meals and deliver those.” 

Chase's son Russell preparing the meals

It is that type of love for a neighbor that makes Aaron Meals special.  Food pantries do great work, but we believe that visiting people in their homes is the special touch!

This is the delicious meal that was delivered!

Support Chase by visiting The Gulf Coast Diner in Carrabelle and enjoying the delicious seafood. While there you can donate to Aaron Meals or simply visit www.aaronmeals.com and donate. Best of all, pass our story along to a friend!  Every meal makes a difference!