Food deserts and struggling farmers are not separate problems. They are two symptoms of the same broken supply chain - one that extracts value from rural and low-income communities and routes it elsewhere.
The core data already exists across food access, agriculture, healthcare, and economic development systems. What is missing is a single tool that combines those signals and makes them usable for people who need to act.
The VFS platform vision is to connect community grocery risk, farm market opportunity, infrastructure planning, healthcare cost burden, and policy decision support in one practical system.
Who This Platform Is For
Community organizationsRegional farmersExtension servicesCooperative developersHospital systemsState policymakers
Flagship Capabilities
Demand Before Crisis
Quantify grocery demand in underserved communities before they are dismissed as non-viable markets.
Early Warning for Closures
Identify at-risk anchor stores early enough for communities, funders, and partners to respond before loss becomes permanent.
Farmer Opportunity Matching
Invert food access distress signals into actionable demand intelligence for nearby producers and cooperative efforts.
Healthcare and Policy ROI
Translate food access gaps into healthcare cost burden, economic leakage, and return-on-investment language for decision makers.
Intervention Measurement
Track whether investments, mobile markets, cooperatives, and infrastructure actually improve community scores over time.
Roadmap By Phase
Phase 1
Understanding Food Demand and Access
Strengthen the current grocery assessment into a fuller market-demand and access intelligence layer.
Move from diagnosis into farmer connection, mobile market planning, and cooperative grocery feasibility.
Farm-to-Desert Distribution FacilitationMobile Market Site PlanningFarmer-Owned Cooperative Grocery Feasibility Model
Phase 6
Longitudinal Tracking and Intervention Measurement
Track community change over time and learn which interventions improve food system outcomes at scale.
Community Score Tracking Over TimeIntervention Correlation Analysis
Phase 7
Advanced Data Enhancements
Improve model accuracy with calibrated behavioral and mobility data where it adds real value.
Mobility Data Integration
Long-Term Platform Vision
The roadmap describes a path from today's assessment workflow to a shared food system planning infrastructure that supports local action, farm opportunity, healthcare partnerships, and statewide policy.
Stage 1
Food Access Analysis Tool
Identifies communities lacking adequate grocery access and quantifies the cost of that absence.
Supports infrastructure investment decisions by connecting supply, demand, healthcare, and employment data in a single framework.
Stage 4
Economic Development Decision Tool
Guides policymakers, cooperative developers, hospital systems, and local organizations in making and measuring the case for investment.
Stage 5
Statewide Policy Infrastructure
Serves as a shared food system intelligence baseline for agricultural, public health, and rural development agencies.
About This Tool & Methodology
VFS Community Grocery Risk Assessment | Alpha 1.1
What This Tool Does
The VFS Community Grocery Risk Assessment helps residents, community leaders, store operators, researchers, and planners understand two related but distinct problems: (1) whether a specific grocery store is at risk of closing, and (2) whether a community or neighborhood already lacks adequate grocery access. By combining your direct observations with publicly available data, it produces a structured risk score and actionable guidance before a crisis occurs.
Assessment Branches
Store Branch: Evaluates an existing grocery store for closure or decline risk. Questions focus on inventory conditions, ownership stability, staffing, margin pressure, and community dependence.
Community Branch: Evaluates a location or neighborhood for grocery access risk without assuming a store is present. Questions focus on current access gaps, transportation barriers, dollar-store substitution, and hardship.
Hybrid Branch: A shorter assessment (8 questions) for situations where the assessor is uncertain whether a store is present or the location type is unclear.
Scoring Framework
The final score (0-100) is the sum of three components:
Questionnaire score: Each answered question contributes 0-7 points based on the severity of the selected response. Unanswered questions ("Not sure") contribute zero points, so partial responses are handled gracefully.
Environmental score: Automatically derived from geocoded store proximity data, USDA food desert designation, and Census poverty indicators. This component captures structural conditions that questionnaire responses alone cannot reflect.
Confidence penalty: A +5 point penalty is applied when only a ZIP code is provided (no street address), reflecting reduced location precision.
A risk floor is applied for community and hybrid assessments: if the objective access classification indicates a more serious condition than the questionnaire score alone, the score is raised to match the access classification minimum.
A stability ceiling is applied only for community and hybrid assessments when two or more major anchor grocery stores are detected within the access threshold: the score is capped at 25 (Stable), reflecting the protective effect of robust market competition.
Risk Score Bands
Score
Category
Interpretation
0 - 25
Stable
No significant risk factors identified. Ongoing monitoring advisable.
26 - 50
Early Warning
Early indicators of potential risk. Proactive engagement recommended.
51 - 75
Elevated Risk
Multiple risk factors present. A deeper feasibility or preservation assessment is advised.
76 - 100
Acute Risk
Serious risk or existing food desert conditions. Immediate community planning is strongly recommended.
Data Sources
Google Maps Geocoding API: Converts addresses to coordinates for spatial analysis.
Google Places Nearby Search API: Identifies grocery stores and food retailers within the location's search horizon (2 miles urban, 10 miles rural). Four search passes are used to maximize recall.
OpenStreetMap / Overpass API: Fallback store data source when Google Maps is unavailable. Enriched with SNAP retailer data to filter closed stores and add stores missing from OSM.
USDA Economic Research Service - Food Access Research Atlas (2019): Provides Low Income / Low Access census tract designations.
US Census Bureau - American Community Survey (ACS) 5-Year Estimates: Provides tract-level population, median household income, poverty rate, and vehicle access data.
USDA Food and Nutrition Service - SNAP Retailer Locator: Provides a current list of USDA-authorized SNAP retailers to validate store classification.
OpenRouteService (ORS) Matrix API: Provides road-network driving distances to the nearest full-service and specialty grocery stores. Distances are displayed in the results table, shown in map popups, and used to inform the AI summary narrative when available.
Nominatim / OpenStreetMap Geocoder: Fallback geocoding when Google Maps API is unavailable.
Store Classification
Stores are classified as full-service grocery or weak food retail (dollar stores, convenience stores, gas stations). Full-service stores contribute to the access assessment; weak retailers do not satisfy grocery access requirements but are counted separately as a substitution indicator.
Stores identified as major national or regional grocery anchors receive additional anchor classification weighting. SNAP authorization type is also used to adjust the classification when SNAP data is available.
Community type is determined from US Census tract population data. Tracts with 1,500 or more residents are classified as Urban; tracts below that threshold are classified as Rural. If census data is unavailable, the location defaults to Urban to avoid triggering an unnecessarily wide search radius.
Distance thresholds for counting stores within range: Urban <= 1 mile, Rural <= 10 miles. Search horizons (the radius queried for candidate stores) are 2 miles for urban and 10 miles for rural locations.
User Store Verification
After receiving results, users can manually verify store classifications across all identified food-access store groups. Each group uses contextually appropriate labels:
Full-Service Grocery Stores & Anchor Stores — default to "Full service grocery." Select "Not full service grocery" to remove a misclassified store from full-service access counts.
Additional Candidates (limited grocery signals) — default to "Not full service grocery." Select "Full service grocery" to promote a store to full-service status, increasing access counts.
Specialty Stores, Produce Markets, Butcher / Meat Markets, Farmers Markets — default to "Verified food source," meaning the store remains counted as a supplemental food source. Select "Not a food source" to exclude a misclassified store entirely.
After making selections, clicking Update Results re-runs the scoring engine using only the verified store data without any new external API calls. The AI summary, if available, is also regenerated to reflect the updated store profile and actual driving distances to nearby stores.
User verifications are preserved in the browser session and reflected in the downloadable PDF report and the store access map (excluded stores appear in amber with a dashed border).
Scenario Planning: Beyond correcting misclassifications, this feature can be used to model hypothetical scenarios — for example, marking an existing full-service grocery store as "Not full service grocery" to simulate what the community's access score would look like if that store were to close. This allows planners, researchers, and community leaders to quantify the potential impact of a store closure or assess how dependent an area is on a single food retailer before a crisis occurs.
Appropriate Use & Limitations
This tool is designed for early warning and community planning. It is not a substitute for a formal feasibility study, market analysis, or legal assessment.
Store proximity data reflects current listings in Google Places or OpenStreetMap, which may occasionally be out of date.
The USDA LILA designation is from 2019 and may not reflect current conditions in rapidly changing markets.
Questionnaire accuracy depends on the completeness and accuracy of the respondent's knowledge.
Census ACS estimates are based on 5-year survey averages and may not reflect very recent demographic shifts.
This tool should be used as one input among many in community planning and grant preparation, not as a standalone determinative assessment.
Suggested Citation
Viable Food Solutions. (2026). VFS Community Grocery Risk Assessment [Tool]. viablefood.org. Accessed April 19, 2026.
