Evergreen emerges from Covid to open eighth store

Health, Beauty and Lifestyle  with Denise McNamara

It’s been a busy lockdown for Evergreen Heathfoods, even though its two owners were forced to cocoon. Now on the verge of opening their eighth store, Aideen and Kieran Hurley show no signs of slowing down despite being in their mid-70s.

“We’re hoping we’ll keep going. We’re both pretty healthy. I’ve cut down on the hours a bit and that’s as far as we’ve gone, gradually cutting back. You have to have the interest to get out of bed in the morning,” she confides.

While their stores on Mainguard Street and in the Galway Shopping Centre were very quiet, the ones in outlying suburbs got very busy and the online store doubled its trade.

“We found while customer count was down, the spend was up, so they weren’t coming in as much but when they did, they would do a big shop.”

The biggest products in demand during the height of the pandemic were vitamin C, D and zinc.

“There’s been a lot of research that vitamin C reduces the severity of the infection. Vitamin D can play a critical role in promoting an immune response and it acts as an anti-inflammatory which may help with acute respiratory distress syndrome.

“Zinc regulates the immune system so you that you have enough T cells to gobble up the virus.”

They also couldn’t not keep enough flour and yeast on the shelves as confined households turned to baking like never before.

“We always have a lot of our customers who come in for organic flour and unbleached flour. All the food has kept up well – people are still cooking and baking at home and not going out as much to restaurants.”

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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