Shopping Transportation Services

It’s a sunny Thursday afternoon, and Mary Willis boards the H.O.M.E. Shopping Bus and sets out from the main office on West Roosevelt Road. She heads north and then drives east along North Avenue, the neighborhood changing around her as she does so. Abandoned storefronts in run-down, crumbling buildings slowly give way to quirky boutiques, trendy fusion restaurants, and cute cafes with tables set up on the sidewalk in a nod to the unseasonable warmth of the day. Mary pulls up to one of Chicago’s many senior buildings, a high-rise that houses about 75 in independent living apartments. It is one of the many buildings from which Mary picks up seniors on a twice-monthly rotating basis. Even though she is 20 minutes early, many seniors already stand in the doorway, eagerly awaiting her arrival, greeting her warmly when they see her. A dozen seniors, mostly female and from a variety of national origins, quickly fill the bus, and soon they’re off to Tony’s Finer Foods in Logan Square. Mary alternates between taking them to Tony’s and Aldi, in keeping with the desires of the group.
Mary has been driving the H.O.M.E. Shopping Bus on-and-off since 2002 and truly enjoys her job. “I like helping the seniors,” she says, “and I love to hear them talk! When they get together on the bus, they tell all these stories—mostly about men—from their younger days. They crack me up!” Mary also enjoys providing a service for which she knows people are truly grateful. In addition to driving them to and from the store and chatting with them along the way, she helps them on and off the bus and refuses to let anyone be burdened by having to haul their own groceries. The seniors frequently try to tip her for all her help, but she always waves the money away.
Many of the Shopping Bus clients do not have anyone else to take them shopping for groceries and other essentials, either because they have no family or because their children have busy schedules of their own or do not live in the area. Dorothy, 76 years old, is one such client. A resident of the building in Wicker Park for the last eight years, she started using the H.O.M.E. Shopping Bus service almost as soon as she moved in. Dorothy likes it where she lives but notes that there are no grocery stores nearby, saying “Wicker Park is nice, but it’s not convenient for everything.” Regarding her experience with the H.O.M.E. Shopping Bus, she says, “It’s convenient for me. This way I’m not lugging groceries on the bus.” It turns out Dorothy would not even be able to get to Tony’s on a single bus ride—she would have to take two buses each way, with heavy grocery bags in tow on the way back. But convenience is not the only draw of the Shopping Bus service for clients like Dorothy. “We have fun together!” she exclaims. “We shop together, tell each other about sales… It’s really fun!”

By Guest Contributor: Ursula Wagner
H.O.M.E. Intern and MA Candidate, 2010
School of Social Service Administration
University of Chicago