South East Market Expansion
South East Market is a small grocery store and food hub with a mission to increase access to healthy, affordable, culturally appropriate food through a sustainable and equitable lens. We do this by working first with our priority vendors which are Black, brown, indigenous, people of color, local and women-led businesses and farms. To support our mission we engage with several urban agriculture efforts and provide support to budding businesses.
A Grand Rapids native, Alita received a B.S. from University of Michigan in Environmental Science and Sustainable Business in May 2020. Upon returning to Grand Rapids she decided to jump into the dream of South East Market, founding the organization after she had been working for several years manifesting it before a Fall 2020 launch. Prior to South East Market Alita was a serial entrepreneur and managed multiple nutrition programs in the nonprofit sector. She enjoys being a local advocate for food sovereignty, urban agriculture and diverse representation in the business sector. Alita does this through community engagement as chair of the City of Grand Rapidsā Urban Agriculture Committee, co-founder of the West Michigan BIPOC Farmer Land Fund and founder of the MLK Park Freedom School and community garden.