About
JOY Community Center
Mission: Addressing food insecurity throughout Greenville, NC
Our primary focus is to deal with food insecurity by providing meals to the poor and homeless in the community.
We are the only place in Greenville that prepares and serves free, nutritious, hot midday & evening meals to address this essential need.
Our patrons represent people from all demographics as we do not discriminate based on race, age, and ethnicity, or underlying health conditions. For some, this may be their only meal of the day.
Current Workflow
Our goal remains to continue serving meals to the vulnerable population of Greenville and surrounding communities, but also to assure the safety of our staff, patrons, and volunteers.
People can dine in for lunch but will continue to serve evening meals as take-out only.
Our Challenges
While serving an average of 250 – 300 daily meals, we are also facing cost escalation due to demand for takeout meals in the restaurant industry: cardboard soup bowls with lids have increased from less than $30/case to over $80/case and three compartment trays with folding tops have increased over 200% in cost.
The Finishing Touches
There are no criteria for eligibility, and we provide meals to all who come to the JOY Community Building.
We’ve been serving soup in Greenville
for over 40 years.
JOY Soup Kitchen was formed when Frances White, the director of the original Greenville Soup Kitchen, serving at The Mount Hermon Lodge, decided to retire.
It was then that The Greenville Soup Kitchen joined forces with Barbara Taft and Jean Dawson who were serving meals at York Memorial A.M.E. Zion Church in west Greenville.
Nancy Singleton suggested the name of Jesus Others and You.
In 1995, we moved to the JOY Community Building at 700 Albemarle Avenue.
