Together Grand Strand: How a Myrtle Beach restaurant paid it forward with free meals
Buckets Bar & Grill owners Coleman Brown and Katie Thompson received a donation from two of their regular customers last week and chose to pay that good deed forward.
The $550 donation was put toward covering the costs of 55 meals comprised of cheeseburgers and fries for the Myrtle Beach Fire Department as they remain on the front lines of the coronavirus outbreak. On Thursday, the Myrtle Beach restaurateurs gave out 25 meals to firefighters, with another 30 scheduled to be picked up next week.
“We chose the local fire departments just because we’re very happy they’re running as normal and keeping things smooth,” Thompson said. “Everybody has been stepping up doing their part.”
While the duo said it felt amazing to give back to the community, they feel even more gratitude from the customers who chose to donate to their restaurant during the coronavirus outbreak. Since mid-march, all bars and dine-in restaurants were mandated to close to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
During that time, the restaurant, located in the Forest Dunes Oceanfront Resort on 5511 N. Ocean Boulevard, has remained open from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. daily for carryout orders. But, despite offering weekly specials to entice customers, Brown said the business has taken a financial hit with the lack of tourists visiting the area.
“We’ve had a beautiful spring, which normally would be very busy, so this is definitely hitting us hard,” said Brown, with Thompson adding that local support has kept them operating during this crisis.
“We rely on tourists a lot but also our locals,” Thompson said. “But we’ve really felt the support not only for us but for the community.”
Guy Curley, who recently relocated from Maryland, said he donated $250 to the restaurant with the purpose supporting a small business and first responders. He added that him and his wife, Keli, are always looking for opportunities to give back to the community.
While Thompson and Brown hope other community members will follow suit and make more donations, they stressed they will be around to aid the first responders within the community in any way through this pandemic.
“We want them to know they can always come in here and we’ll always give them a discount,” Brown said. “We love doing this for them.”
Editor’s note: Together Grand Strand is a series focused on the good deeds happening in our community during the coronavirus pandemic. If you know of an act of kindness that we should highlight, please email sneditors@thesunnews.com with the subject title “Together Grand Strand idea.”
This story was originally published May 2, 2020 at 10:00 AM.
