“Thomaston Grocery, with its historic building on Main Street, is scheduled to be purchased this month by Tommytown.org - Thomaston Community Development Corporation.

This store is a downtown cornerstone and critical to Thomaston's ongoing revival.

It's a vital market for local seafood and produce, and most of the money we spend there, unlike that spent in local supermarkets, stays in town. Thomaston needs its only Main St. grocery store - It's the heartbeat of our town!

And yet, selling groceries is a low-margin business. Upon learning a year ago that long-time owner John Vigue had listed the property for sale, we saw the strong risk that a new owner might not continue its use as a grocery store. Deciding to act to keep this business on our Main St., we created Tommytown.org, Thomaston's first independent Community Development Corporation. It's one of the hundred or so nonprofit community development corporations (CDCs) in Maine, each of them a tool for nurturing the places we live.

Our purchase of Thomaston Grocery follows almost 12 months of effort, resulting in us obtaining finance from Maine State Credit Union and mission aligned lender, Coastal Enterprises Inc. With the seller's help and co-operation, plus public and corporate donations, we've made it to this historic moment. Going forward, Tommytown.org will assist with other Thomaston revitalization projects, but for now our focus is to ensure that the grocery store thrives.”