A Look Back at the Weird and Wonderful World of the General Store in 2020

April 2020

With so many restaurants closing either temporarily or for good in April, we started our Saxapahaw Farm Fresh Box as a way to connect local farmers directly to consumers to get straight from the farm produce, meat and milk every week.

Farmer John from Dinner Bell Farm was a huge help in organizing our Farm Fresh Box program, bringing in lots of greens and root vegetables.

People had been asking for sliders on the menu for a long time, and so in April, we finally added these pimento cheese and bacon sliders, which you can still find on our all-day specials board. They’re delicious!

You know what else people had been requesting for a long time that we didn’t get around to implementing until it became a necessity in 2020? Delivery! Local musician Bruce Horvath was happy to join the team as the General Store’s first delivery driver!

A single roll of toilet paper, preciously guarded on the step of a motorcycle…a sign of the times.

In April, we all learned what Zoom was, and how to use to to continue to do business and to plan even if it seemed the world was falling apart.

In April, our grocery sales went way up, which helped with the lack of kitchen sales due to the pandemic. But we hung in there, still cooking!

A local documentary filmmaker stopped by Saxapahaw to see how businesses in NC were dealing with the rapidly changing conditions.

Masks and social distancing, now something that’s just standard practice, first became a thing to take seriously in April, as covid wasn’t just a thing that was happening in a few states or big cities.

Another new service we started offering in April was direct seafood ordering. Place your order for fresh seafood and pick it up on Tuesday, Thursday or Sunday. We’ll even bring it out to your car!

Even as masks quickly became scarce, we had many talented locals who made face masks for our employees, and even made them to match the store!

Oh, and Jeff made his first instructional cooking video for the General Store! You can watch it by clicking on the link below:

Watch Jeff show you how to make pan-seared red grouper in white wine sauce

Click Page 5 or the next page button below to continue into May 2020!