If you spend time at Together We Cope food pantry, a Food Depository partner in Tinley Park, you’ll soon understand what a vital resource it is for the more than 550 households who visit each month.
“You don’t know how important this help is for me,” Andrea Thames, 61, said of the food she gets at Together We Cope.
Thames was a special education teacher with a master’s degree and three grown sons when an injury left her unable to work for two years. A lack of income and mounting medical costs made already tight finances unlivable. Together We Cope became a lifeline.
“This pantry means me having enough food for the whole month,” Thames said.
Andrea Thames called the pantry reopening a cause for celebration. (Photos by Nancy Stone for the Food Depository.)
Aaquila Hall, 26, visits the pantry to make sure her household – which includes her husband, their two kids and several children they’ve taken in for family members – has enough to eat.
Though Hall and her husband both work, she said it’s challenging to make ends meet.
“Groceries are expensive. By the time you pay for diapers and medicine – it’s rough getting all the bills paid at once,” she said. “This pantry helps us a lot.”
It’s only when you know how important the pantry is for its guests that you can grasp how celebrated its reopening was late last year, more than 18 months after a devastating fire destroyed the beloved resource.
A Total Loss
Together We Cope pantry coordinator Tony Roman will never forget the day when he pulled up to work to find multiple firetrucks in the parking lot and smoke billowing out of the building. It was the Monday before Thanksgiving in 2022 and they were supposed to distribute turkeys and other holiday food that week.
“It was brutal,” Roman said.
Pantry coordinator Tony Roman shows a guest their new space.
Thankfully no one was hurt, but everything in the pantry and their thrift shop next door was destroyed by fire and smoke, including shelving and refrigerators. Officials think an electrical spark lit the plastic bags they used to store clothes for the shop.
Concerned for the hundreds of neighbors they served before the fire, Together We Cope directed guests and food donations from the community to nearby pantries, where attendance tripled while they worked to rebuild.
“Every hang up and hiccup that could happen did,” Roman said of the pantry’s reconstruction, with delays pushing their reopening back multiple times.
The pantry is run almost entirely by a team of dedicated volunteers.
Throughout the process, the Food Depository helped with funds for construction, grocery carts, shelving and freezers. Executive director Kathryn Straniero said she was touched that Food Depository staff were the first ones on the scene the day of the fire, assuring them of our support.
“The Food Depository played a gigantic role,” Roman said. “I was amazed by the depths they will go to help agencies serve neighbors.”
A Joyful Reopening
When the pantry reopened on July 30, 2024, the space was filled with new fixtures, abundant food and joy. “A lot of people, not just the guests, were clawing at our doors for us to reopen – some so they could support us,” said Roman, noting the generosity of the community and volunteers. The pantry is now open four days a week for five hours a day.
For Thames, her first visit to the reopened pantry felt like a reunion. “We were celebrating, hugging everyone. I was so happy,” she said, adding that she had driven by the pantry practically every week while it was closed to check on the progress.
“It meant everything when it (the pantry) reopened.”
Rebuilding allowed the pantry to maximize their space to serve more guests more effectively. Expanded cold storage allows the pantry to offer additional dairy, produce and eggs. While guests used to receive pre-packaged bags of food before the fire, they now shop in a market-like setting for the items they want, giving them the dignity of choice.
Volunteer Helen Bohlig loves connecting with pantry guests.
The market setting also enables the volunteers who run the pantry – including Helen Bohlig, 65 – to connect with guests as they shop. Bohlig had been volunteering for eight years when fire shuttered the pantry. The grandmother of nine serves guests at the pantry four days a week, proud of their “beautiful new space” and grateful to be back helping her neighbors.
Fellow volunteer Bud Jensen, 71, shares her joy at resuming their service. “After the fire it was important to get back here and help,” he said.
“This is my passion – helping people and making sure they’re eating.”
New and Improved
The guests are thrilled with the new, improved Together We Cope. Jennifer Cortes, 31, works full-time at a hotel and still struggles to buy enough food for her two sons, ages 3 and 7, who she said are always hungry.
“The price of groceries is high. By the end of the month, even with budgeting everything, there’s not enough,” she said. “It means a lot to get food here.”
Jennifer Cortes selects food for her two young sons.
Miranda Blondel, 60, loves the pantry’s new market-like model. “Now you can decide if you want something or not,” she said, calling the new space beautiful.
Blondel, who can’t work due to health issues, visits Together We Cope to get food for her household of eight, including her husband, mom and three grandchildren. “I missed this pantry a lot.”
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