((PKG))  STUDENT-RUN GROCERY STORE     
((Banner:  Access - Groceries)) 
((Reporter/Camera:  Deepak Dobhal))
((Map:  Cody, Nebraska))    
 
((NATS)) 
((Bryan Sexon, Rancher)) 
We'd have to go to Valentine for ice cream.  So, we'd have to go 
40 miles [64 km]. 
((NATS)) 
((Bryan Sexon, Rancher)) 
It’s nice to not have to drive 40 miles [64 km] to get some sort of 
groceries or supplies.  If you are, you know, before you had to 
stock up.  Just depended on who you are.  Some people went to 
town every couple of weeks, some once a month.  We went to 
Gordon once a month.  It’s 90 miles [145 km] to get groceries.  
Lot of folks don't realize how rural it is.  So, the folks that live 
south but have kids that come to school here, they can have their 
kids pick something up and take home if they needed or 
whatever.  So, that it's a nice addition.  
((NATS)) 
((Janet Shelbourne, Business Teacher, Cody-Kilgore High 
School))  
We hadn't had a grocery store in 15 years or so, in Cody.  If your 
kids are going to school here in Cody and you come for a 
basketball game and you've already driven 40 miles to get here 
and you still can't get groceries, then you have to travel an 
additional.   
((NATS)) 
((Janet Shelbourne, Business Teacher, Cody-Kilgore High 
School))  
Without a grocery store, families were making other choices.  
They were going to other areas for school.  We have a lot of 
towns along Highway 20 here that there's a few buildings left.  
The churches are disappearing.  The stores have all disappeared.  
The gas stations have disappeared.  You've lost your schools.  
You've lost your banks.  You've lost a lot of the main businesses.  
So that's the fear, you know.  ((NATS)) 
((Rocky Richards, Chairperson, Village Board))  
There was just that little bit of a questionable, what are we going 
to do?  What's going to happen if we don't get busy?  My name is 
Rocky Richards and I have been Chair of the village board for 
three years.  Some of those schools that haven't survived, have 
probably taken the town with them.  And that's a sad, sad fact.   
((NATS)) 
((Rocky Richards, Chairperson, Village Board))  
Cody-Kilgore was in a down cycle, not many students.  We 
weren't short of students but we didn't have near as many as what 
we would have liked.  One in-service superintendent had said, 
“You know, if we don't do something, in four years we might not 
be here.  So, do you want to plan for that?  Or do you want to plan 
to survive?”  You know, you kind of hated to hear that comment 
coming from the superintendent, but at the same time it was kind 
of the kick in the seat of the pants we needed.  
((NATS)) 
((Janet Shelbourne, Business Teacher, Cody-Kilgore High 
School))  
It was the brainchild of two teachers and they were just kind of 
joking and said, “We should build a grocery store.”  That is 
something that would draw people to sending their children to 
Cody-Kilgore schools.  It would draw people to want to come to 
Cody so it doesn't just eliminate itself off the map.  
((NATS)) 
((Bentley Jenkins, Recent Graduate, Cody-Kilgore High 
School))   
This is our classroom.  When we get off the van, we will load into 
here and if you're taking like marketing, management, accounting, 
business law, you'll stay in here.  If you're taking work-based 
learning, you will go out to the floor and do whatever is needed.  
As you can see in here, it's a little more than just the classroom.  
It's kind of the storage area also.  We have our grocery special 
orders….. 
((Janet Shelbourne, Business Teacher, Cody-Kilgore High 
School))  
It's a student run store.  Students come down for classes.  They 
also have work-based learning.  They handle a lot of the day-to-
day organizational things.  So, we don't have payroll during the 
day.  Their time is a huge contributing factor for the success of the 
store.  
((Bentley Jenkins, Recent Graduate, Cody-Kilgore High 
School)) 
When we come to take classes here, we'll get off our van that the 
school will take us on and then we will come into the classroom, 
sit and Mrs. Shelbourne will come in, let us know what 
everybody's job is.  Your job can be like one person can be 
running the register that hour.  They can be learning how to count 
their change and check people out, doing the basics.  Other 
people will like clean, stock the coolers, freezers, whatever they 
need to.  
((NATS)) 
((Janet Shelbourne, Business Teacher, Cody-Kilgore High 
School))  
Prior to getting it up off the ground, people put in tons and tons of 
hours trying to figure out how this was going to work, where the 
funding was going to come from, applying for things, trying to 
make plans.  
((NATS)) 
((Rocky Richards, Chairperson, Village Board)) 
Once it looked like the store was going to become a reality and 
the community got behind it, people showed up.  Ah, gobs of 
people showed up.  Kids showed up.  When they started building 
the frame, putting in the bales, stuccoing, painting, you could go 
past any day and see a wide variety of ages out here working on 
it.  Cost of the building would have been way, way more if we'd 
had to pay for labor.   
((NATS)) 
((Rocky Richards, Chairperson, Village Board)) 
I think it’s helped stop the decline.  You talk to other people and 
they're shopping here.  So, they come for shopping.  They might 
stop and get gas.  They go across the street to the feed store, 
downtown to the bar and grill, the bank, maybe stop in at the 
school if they have kids there, get a haircut.  You know they're 
coming to town and if they're coming to town, somebody might 
think that's a good place to put a new business in because it's not 
seen as a town that’s may be dying or fading away.  It's seen as a 
town that has a little bit of vitality going on.  
((NATS)) 
((Janet Shelbourne, Business Teacher, Cody-Kilgore High 
School)) 
School enrollment has increased.  We're at some of the highest 
levels that Cody-Kilgore has ever had.  Younger people are 
coming to town and hoping to be able to raise their families here 
and attend school here.  This has worked pretty well with 
integrating the education with the grocery store.  
((NATS)) 
((Rocky Richards, Chairperson, Village Board))  
Our little motto is A Town Too Tough To Die.  If it wasn't for the 
community people that wanted Cody to survive and had that 
attitude that we're too tough to die, we probably would have died. 
((NATS))