We are thrilled to honor Brahm Ahmadi, the Executive Director and Founder of People’s Community Market (PCM) at our 27th Anniversary Gala: “The Art of Building Legacy."
Brahm has been a force in our community for over 16 years and started building his legacy upon his arrival in 2000 as an advocate for social and environmental justice work. Brahm fell in love with the West Oakland neighborhood as he met folks and talked to principals in the community about the issues we were (are) having around segregation, gentrification, race, classism, power and privilege.
The topic of food access and health issues also kept coming up and it was not until Brahm moved to West Oakland and experienced the lack of access himself that he began to really think about West Oakland’s struggle with food injustices.
West Oakland’s 25,000 residents don’t have easy access to a local grocery store that has quality options at affordable prices, and therefore residents have to purchase high priced processed food at corner stores, or travel great distances to get healthy options. Brahm and his partners, Malaika Edwards and Leander Sellers, realized nothing was being done about this issue.
“I got excited about the possibility of making social change around this issue of building a grocery store where we could achieve positive social impact in a sustainable way for the city of West Oakland. We could serve the neighborhood, tackle health and diet related issues, and create a place where people could gather, talk about issues in the community and return West Oakland residents to their rich food culture.” said Brahm.
After doing lengthy research, Brahm, Edwards and Sellers realized that making PCM a reality would take a lot more work than they first anticipated. They were dedicated to establishing a sustainable and successful concept in West Oakland and so they decided to first create People’s Grocery, a local nonprofit. Brahm and partners wanted to focus on gathering knowledge and insights about the grocery business and more importantly, they wanted to build trust and a stronger relationship with the community around the issues of food justice.
After doing lengthy research, Brahm, Edwards and Sellers realized that making PCM a reality would take a lot more work than they first anticipated. They were dedicated to establishing a sustainable and successful concept in West Oakland and so they decided to first create People’s Grocery, a local nonprofit. Brahm and partners wanted to focus on gathering knowledge and insights about the grocery business and more importantly, they wanted to build trust and a stronger relationship with the community around the issues of food justice.
“Trust and a strong foundation is the biggest asset we have with the community. We had to show up, walk the walk, talk the talk, and make sure that residents knew we were the real deal." -Brahm
It was not until 2009, that Brahm got the blessing from the People’s Grocery Board to transition to the People’s Community Market (PCM) project as the CEO and founder, and in 2011, Brahm set out to raise capital. After pitching PCM to multiple impact investors, Brahm was denied because they didn’t understand the potential of PCM nor the community. Thankfully a more successful and inclusive business model prevailed. PCM has raised $1.5 million with a public stock offering that gave over 400 California residents the opportunity to purchase shares.
Additionally, with broad public support, an angel investor, and the help of East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation (EBALDC), a local affordable housing developer, the project has since generated an additional $1.8 million in public and private funding for a remarkable total of $3.3 million. PCM is set to open in 2017 at 3103 Myrtle St near San Pablo.
We applaud Brahm for his conscious dedication to the West Oakland Community.
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Please join us at our 27th Anniversary Gala: The Art of Building Legacy
Let's celebrate Brahm and his vision as one of AHC's Super Heroes.
Additional Articles and Videos:
People’s Community Market finally secures West Oakland location - Inside Scoop SF
After setbacks, People’s Market secures Oakland site - Berekly side
Bringing Food to the People - The Atlantic
More Than Just a Grocery Store. Fresh Perspective in Oakland. - My People's Market
Filling the Food Desert - Unobscura
Food for West Oakland - Oakland North
People's Grocery - Documentary