Keeping products local

Though Jay and Lori Cox have only owned Lenox Market for about two months, they were proud to show off their locally-owned grocery store to Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig last Friday as he toured several locations in Southwest Iowa.

Lenox Market was Naig’s final of three stops, also spending time at Holdfast Farmstead in Mount Ayr and with the Brooke family in Clarinda. The goal? To encourage and support Iowans in using locally grown and produced food.

That’s also the goal of the Choose Iowa program, something Naig brought up after Jay asked how Lenox Market could sell more local goods in store.

“We launched Choose Iowa about two and a half years ago at the Iowa State Fair. Actually, we doubled the membership just in 2025, so we have over 300 members,” Naig said. “There’s a directory on our website that would have, if you’re looking for beef, looking for apples, you could do that by map, you could search.”

Producers, distributors and stores can all be Choose Iowa members. The only stipulation is that they have products that are grown, raised or made within Iowa.

While not yet a Choose Iowa member, Lenox Market does sell plenty of local food, ranging from beef from Zeb’s Smokehouse to local honey.

Though Naig was promoting Choose Iowa, that wasn’t the only reason for Naig’s visit to Lenox Market. He also wanted to learn more about the store and what comes with owning and operating an independent shop.

Highlights included Lenox Market’s meat counter and their variety of Latin and Hispanic foods, an important service in a community with a population of more than 25% Hispanic or Latino persons.

Jay and Lori are also proud to offer delivery as one of their services. However, they’ve run into issues in delivering to customers who use food stamps.

“For our deliveries, we can’t use food stamps for food stamps people. We do not charge for delivery,” Jay said. “I can understand them not wanting to be charged for it, but if it’s just for the food… A lot of our people are elderly or have jobs during the day. That’s a good source for them."

Lenox Market offers delivery throughout Southwest Iowa. Delivery began with the store’s previous owners, but began to lose popularity near the end of their ownership. However, Jay is excited for it to pick back up.

“Soon we’ll be pushing it out there,” Jay said. “We’ll be in the Creston paper and a bunch of other things to advertise. I really think it will pick back up. I’m ready to build it.”

In all their endeavors, Naig said he was proud of what Jay and Lori were doing.

“We appreciate the investment in your community, keeping this grocery store going here,” Naig said.