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Paul:
Take a drive or a casual stroll down Manship Street, right behind the Belhaven Building, across from Baptist Hospital. If you haven't been that way in a while, you'll discover quite the surprise: the development that's popped up over the last couple of years.

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Hey, it's Paul Wolf, with a front row seat to conversations on culture from Jackson, Mississippi. We call our podcast Soul Sessions. It's the people, places, and events that make the City With Soul shine. And on today's episode, I'm taking you to Belhaven Town Center and one of the most unique retailers this city has ever seen. Emily Pote's Beans & Bananas - named that because of two of her kids' nicknames - is eclectic and wide-ranging in its offerings. So I asked Emily, would it be fair to call it an upscale general store?

Emily:
It's funny you say that because I say that all the time. So maybe you heard that from me.

Paul:
No, not at all.

Emily:
No way. Really?

Paul:
Nope.

Emily:
Well, yeah, that's what I call it. I call it a high-end general store. I want it to be a place where maybe you don't know what we have, but you know we'll have what you need. And you come and get everything from groceries to birthday gifts.

Paul:
It is a one-stop shop. I've told my wife Sophie, "If we need a gift for somebody, no offense to any other stores in town, but we got to check out Beans & Bananas first." You've got a little bit of everything, don't you?

Emily:
We really do. We have everything from dog foods, to Montessori-led toys, to even some clothing for women. We've been selling a lot of pajamas for spring break trips and summer camps. Organic produce. Momofuku noodles. Really just across the board. We've been trying to find those products that our customers are interested in seeing in Jackson, but aren't currently in Jackson.

Paul:
And some really delicious meat, too. For Valentine's Day, we bought a steak from Beans & Bananas that you carry from a local farm - a pretty local farm - called Persimmon Ridge.

Emily:
Yeah, Persimmon Ridge is out of Neshoba County. And before we ever opened, we bought a whole cow, which is a scary thing to do. Like, "I'd like to take a cow, please." But yeah, we got everything from the livers and the tongue, to the filets and the ground beef. And it's been really fun to talk with our customers about these interesting cuts of meat that you don't see all the time, and seeing them grow and be curious along with us.

Paul:
And I know you're really being conscious about people who have food allergies, carrying some items just for them.

Emily:
We carry several lines that have gluten-free products. We even have a gluten-free make-your-own pizza dough out of gluten-free crust. Even pasta that's gluten-free, and Annie's mac and cheese that's gluten-free. We have several friends in the neighborhood who have helped us find those products. And then we've just done a ton of research ourselves.

And so, again, we want this to be a place that's not just your stock-and-standard produce and shelf-stable groceries, but those odd things that maybe you've been having to order from the internet. And wouldn't it be nice if when you ran out, you could just run out to the store and get it?

Paul:
Yeah, and support local, too. I know that's important to you. I know community, sustainability... there are a lot of different factors that played into building Beans & Bananas. Backtrack just a little bit: where did the idea for this come from?

Emily:
It came from a lot of different places, but it definitely started during the pandemic. My whole family was home. We'd all been spread to the winds and then here we are, all, at the time, four of us, creating in the same space. Creating a lot of trash and consuming a lot. And it just became really obvious that some of the products we were purchasing weren't sustainable in the way that we wanted them to be.

And I just said, "Wouldn't it be nice if we didn't have to order and there was someone out there who I could go ask, instead of having to find every sustainable and recyclable blog imaginable out in the world?" And then of course, my little business brain said, "Well, you can do that, Emily." And my husband said, "No, please, no."

So, we started. Here we are in 2023 actually open. Not in a pandemic anymore. Getting our community together in a space where we're feeding them and we're making sure that what they leave the store with is good for them and good for their family.

Paul:
Speaking of feeding, we haven't mentioned your sandwich counter. You've got some grab-and-go sandwiches and sides right there in Beans & Bananas.

Emily:
We do. We wanted it to be like a deli counter. We're growing it slowly as our community gets used to having it there. But right now we have grab-and-go sandwiches that we press. They're really, really good hot. We have charcuterie boxes, and hummus, and pimento cheese. We call them dunkaroos, for those of you from the '90s.

They're just good snacks that if you're there and you need something to go with your beer, maybe it's a Sunday or a Monday and the restaurants are closed in the area, there's some actual food you can take home with you. We hope to grow that. We're just starting out there. But yeah, we want you to, just like at a regular grocery store, be able to actually eat something, too.

Paul:
And you've got the coolest toy store in town, I have to say.

Emily:
We joke that we're three stores in one. With a grocery part, we have home goods. And then, yeah, we have a pretty big toy section. As a mom of three, I know how important it is for my sanity when I go to a store and there's something for my kids to do so I can just focus on the three tasks I have at hand. And so we have a kids' play area. We really encourage moms to let their kids touch. We joke that we need signs that says, "No, it's OK to touch."

We have tents out front usually. And we've been doing a lot of free events for kids, just to encourage trying out some of these toys that maybe are a little different than what you've seen regularly. But more than that, to be an active participant and an active partner in our community. That's definitely part of our business model, to not just be a place where you spend money, but a place that spends time on its community, as well.

Paul:
Tell me what you've got coming up, maybe some future plans for Beans & Bananas. I realize that you've got your hands full opening a new store right now, but you have plans to grow.

Emily:
We do. Events are something that our community has really gotten excited about. We've done some ticketed events so far. We have some in March. We have St. Paddy's Day parade crown making right before the parade. And in April, we're hoping to do even more things around Easter and Second Saturday. But there's only so much you can do when your store's open full-time, right?

And so, we're looking at some event space to maybe offer some birthday parties, even adult birthday parties. I'm just joking. I would love to go to a Beans & Bananas birthday party. Corporate events. And just to have a community space as well. We joke that we'd love to see a knitting circle on Wednesday nights and things like that.

So, again, just wanting to invest in our community, listening to what our customers are saying that they'd like to see. And honestly, what we want to see in our community and what we want to be able to give.

Paul:
You're contributing to community through what you're doing there at Beans & Bananas. So I have to ask, why here? Why Jackson, Mississippi? Why do you want to help make it such a special place?

Emily:
Yeah. It is something that I just decided early on in my life that I saw lots of friends graduating high school, and leaving and going other places. And the reason they left is because this was not the place that was going to support them in the way they felt they needed. And the thought that just kept coming to mind, like starting Beans & Bananas, is, "Well, I can do that. I can help make that the kind of place that people would want to stay for." And it just came near and dear to my heart.

And so, I've been in Jackson since then. I went to school in Clinton. I came back immediately and started working at small businesses, and have been here ever since. I walk to work a good bit here at the Town Center because we live within walking distance. And the people here that we live and work with and support are just some of the best people in the whole world, in my opinion. They really care about their community. They care about each other. They understand that that's what makes a place attractive. It's the people who volunteer their time, who care about their neighbor, and want to be present in their community and stick around.

Paul:
"It's always the people," as the late Jackson photographer James Patterson once told me. Emily's shop on Instagram, @beans.bananas, is truly unique. Check in with them for upcoming events and stop by today. See them seven days a week at the Belhaven Town Center.

Soul Sessions is produced by Visit Jackson. We're the destination organization for Mississippi's capital city. Our executive producers are Jonathan Pettus and Dr. Rickey Thigpen. You can learn more about us at our website, always up to date and fresh at visitjackson.com. I'm Paul Wolf, and you've been listening to Soul Sessions.

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