Good Neighbor Podcast Northport
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Good Neighbor Podcast Northport
Jenny Waltman's Mission-Driven Construction: Empowering Birmingham Through Grace Klein Community
Jenny Waltman, a visionary leader and the driving force behind Grace Klein Construction and Grace Klein Community, shares her extraordinary story with us. In this episode, you'll discover how a simple prayer in 2006 led Jenny to build a construction company with a mission that transcends brick and mortar. Faced with the economic challenges of 2008, her unwavering faith and determination paved the way for Grace Klein Community's inception in 2010. What began as a humble food delivery service for 58 families has now expanded to nourish nearly 20,000 people in Birmingham, Alabama every week. Through Jenny's insights, we challenge common misconceptions about poverty and highlight the vital role of providing healthy food to empower individuals towards financial independence.
Join us as we explore the transformative power of community service, ignited by Jenny's pivotal experience at a child's birthday party in an impoverished area. Our conversation sheds light on the broader mission of Grace Klein Community, educating on resourcefulness and stewardship while uniting people from all walks of life. Learn about their innovative food rescue initiative, which cleverly tackles food waste and insecurity, demonstrating how unrelated issues can be woven into holistic solutions. Jenny's journey serves as a modern-day parable of faith and community, reflecting the miraculous nature of giving and receiving sustenance, much like the biblical manna. Don't miss this inspiring narrative of building a strong community through unwavering service and compassion.
#Podcast #GNPBirmingham #WomenInConstruction #JennyWaltman #GraceKleinCommunity #GraceKleinConstruction #FaithInAction #CommunityService #FoodInsecurity #FoodRescue #PovertyAwareness #HealthyFoodForAll #HolisticSolutions #CommunityImpact #BirminghamAL #LeadershipJourney #InspiringStories #MissionDriven #FaithAndBusiness #NonProfitLeadership #FoodWasteSolutions #EmpoweringCommunities #GiveBack #BuildingCommunity #ModernParable #CompassionInAction
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Patricia Blondheim.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. I'm your host, Patricia Blondheim, and today we have good neighbor Jenny Waltman, and Jenny is the president of Grace Klein Construction and the founder, CEO and chairman of the board of the Grace Klein Community. Jenny, how are you today?
Speaker 3:I'm great. Thank you so much, Patricia, for having me on the show.
Speaker 2:Well, it's an extreme pleasure and I'm so excited to let the listeners know about everything that you do, so I'm just going to let you go. What brought you into construction? Tell me a little bit about Grace Klein Construction and how it became the Grace Klein Community.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So we have to kind of start with Grace Klein Construction to understand how Grace Klein Community evolved, and only God could write the story. So Grace Klein Construction began in 2006 with no backup plan. And then I remember the other day I was looking at a memory and I forgot but I did pray 1 Corinthians 4.10 back in 2006, where it's talking about Jabez, the prayer of Jabez and how you would bless me, god, you would enlarge my territory, you would let your hand be with me, you would keep me from harm and free from pain, and then how God granted Jabez's request and I would pray that prayer and I had no idea what I was really doing and how that would really happen to me here in Birmingham, alabama. So we had started the construction company in 2006.
Speaker 3:And in 2008, the economy was really struggling. I was in the middle of the field in Swaziland wondering how we would survive, and God showed me Grace Klein will make it and you'll do much greater things than construction. He had somebody give me that prophetic word. I came home, peace was all over me, the economy crashed, we had $120,000 in expenses that month and our income was only forty thousand dollars. It was insane, but I wasn't really afraid because I knew God had told me we would make it, and we did, miraculously, barely some moments.
Speaker 3:And then, in August 2009, we had renovated a house in Historic Forest Park and so our daughter was zoned to go to the inner city school and she was the minority in her class. And so we went to that school and when we saw the need of that community and realized, oh my word, we've been under a rock and we need to be faithful to care for the poor, we said that we care for the poor, but we really did nothing about it. So we were really not true to who we said that we were. So we started a monthly food delivery in October of 2009, and we served 58 families at that time. Now, we were never planning to start a nonprofit. We were just going to do grace client construction and do the right thing and care for the hungry. And then we had over 200 volunteers and they asked for we we should meet. Let's what we need to figure this out. They were telling me we have to start a nonprofit. I'm like we do construction, but because all these people were asking, I called the IRS and they were like honey, you run a nonprofit turn in your papers I'm like honey. And she had told me that since y'all were already doing the steps of a nonprofit, you would be immediately approved, which we were. And in April 2010 is when we officially became a 501C3 nonprofit.
Speaker 3:Now, at that time, my anxiety was out the roof and I just wanted to obey Jesus and trust him with my compounding yes I. Construction was hard, you hard. We were coming out of that bad economy. We were trusting God to provide. That was kind of enough. And then here we are, trying to feed people and serve the community, and I remember my faith just being so small compared to the daily needs of Grace Klein Construction and Grace Klein Community, compared to the daily needs of Grace Klein Construction and Grace Klein Community, and even smaller against the greatness of God. But I came to understand that if I just had a little bit of faith, that he would do the rest. And so it's just been a crazy ride to see how he continues to use Grace Klein Construction to serve the community through residential remodeling and repairs, and now how Grace Klein community has just really exploded. He has truly expanded our territory and we are serving so many people every single week. We actually feed almost 20,000 people every single week here out in Birmingham, alabama.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, jenny, that's a that's, that's a big number. Yes, it's crazy, yeah, it's. It's stunning that you serve that many people. It's also stunning that so many people require that service. And that's really where I want to lean into, because I think a lot of our listeners don't understand that the level of hunger that there is here in the United States and, by extension, here in Alabama, it is when you open your eyes, you can't close them again.
Speaker 3:That's right. And you know, one in seven people in Alabama are hungry and many of our people are hand to mouth workers, which a lot of people don't understand that concept. But they are going to work, they are trying and they are needing every dollar that they make to be able to survive. So if they have any emergency, if their car breaks down, if their kid needs medicine, then they don't have enough margin to be able to get the healthy food that they need. And that's really where Grace Klein Community comes in.
Speaker 3:Many people are surprised in this kind of a let's bust the stereotype because people think, oh, people in poverty don't do anything, they're lazy, they just sit at home. And that is not true. We serve many people that work full-time jobs or multiple jobs, but they just can't get enough margin. And so if we can provide that healthy food support, then we can help them to be able to stay well, to report to their jobs, and then they'll be able to advance in their jobs and they won't need the food, because then they'll be able to make more income. So it all kind of jumps on top of each other, one yes to another yes, and if we all work together then we really can address this need here in Alabama.
Speaker 2:Well, I think it's a little bit of backstory on you. I mean, you arrive here suddenly, you're in the construction business, but what got you here was really what you were before that. So tell me a little bit about what brought you to Grace Klein.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I graduated from Sanford University and I was working at an insurance company. I was an insurance adjuster. I love serving people and I worked in the fire company side. So I was actually dealing with homes and helping people with fire losses and storm damages and helping them recover from the unexpected things that happen in life and really being able to walk through crisis with people. I mean, many of my clients had lost family members in their fires or in these storms and so just being able to be there and be a support, fires or in these storms, and so just being able to be there and be a support. So it was kind of natural to go into the construction industry with my husband and be a contractor. It was funny because I went to go get my home builder's license and I was so nervous to go and take my test and I came out and I got a B on my test and I was so dejected he thought I failed. And I came out and I got a B on my test and I was so dejected he thought I fell. But I just am a high performer and I was so bummed out that I was able to get my homeowner's license.
Speaker 3:I remember driving the dually to the landfill and thinking what is my life? But then it was just natural whenever we were, our daughter was going to the inner city school and we thought, well, we got to be friends with these families and so we had gone to her birthday party in suburbia and it was with the blow up water slides and the party favors and all the stuff. And then she asked could we go to her friend's birthday party from her class? And we're like, well, sure. So we went from one birthday party to the other. The second birthday party changed the trajectory of our lives because it backed up to abandoned projects. Except those projects were not abandoned and people were squatting in them.
Speaker 3:And a little eight-year-old boy came up to the fence and he had something strapped on his back. And my husband's like what's that on your back? He said, oh, it's my gun. Everybody has one, so I have to have me one. And my husband would try not to burst out crying, thinking what is this? And then I went inside to allow my children to go to the bathroom and they had nothing in their house except mattresses on the floor, literally nothing.
Speaker 3:I'm like, oh my word, this is Birmingham, alabama, and I don't know where I've been, but I was so convicted by God because in James it talks about that If you know the good you ought to do and don't do it, that is sin for you. So here I am looking at my life and we're shams. You know, like we say that we follow Jesus and that we love the poor and we do nothing. So that's kind of how Grace Klein community births and we just jumped out in faith. We didn't even really weigh the cost, we just wanted to quit disobeying God. We never imagined what God would do or that he would explode our opportunity to be able to serve so many people in our community Today we actually have drive-thru locations in Inslee, hoover, bessemer, the city of Birmingham, and we have feed BHM hubs in Calera, hoover and Bessemer.
Speaker 3:We're able to fuel 252 food distribution partners who come and get food and take it to other areas as well as those different locations that we're serving. So it's just crazy to see how our yes has compounded to more and more people being able to say yes and how if we just say the first yes, that God will do the rest, like we don't. If I knew where we were going today I would think I can't do that and I would have maybe said no to God, but thankfully, I just wanted to obey God and so I said yes. And through the end of October of 2024, we've served over 435,000 unique people. So that means that the person has only been counted one time that they've come, but many of the people come multiple times or they can come every week to receive food support.
Speaker 2:Can you tell us about any misconceptions that people have when they're looking at Graceline?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think people consider people in poverty is like they're they're apathetic or they're lazy, or you're just give it, you're just helping mooches and everybody just deserves a hand up. And actually all of us need help. We're either, you know, struggling emotionally, relationally, physically, spiritually, you know financially. Every single one of us have a poverty and so if we can bust up that and help people realize, no, we're all equal, we all need support, we all need community, and one thing that's so beautiful about Grace Klein community is we are educational, so we are able to teach people about resourcefulness and wise stewardship and just being faithful with the little things and the big things. And it allows us to bring people together that think different, that look different, that live different, that believe differently from one another, and we can be this safe space where we can unite around something that really matters and that's Jesus and caring for one another, the people that he created, and he created all of us, and we're all very special, we're all valued. So I think that really helps to break that misconception. Another secondary misconception is the food.
Speaker 3:People think you rescue food. Is that gonna be good? Is that gross, is that old? It was going to the landfill and what we do is. We adopted a food rescue app. It's called appfoodrescueus, and volunteers rescue food from 6 am to 10 pm at night, seven days a week. That average food rescue feeds approximately 100 people and these volunteers bring in all this good food from restaurants and catering companies and wholesale suppliers and anywhere that good food is, and we're able to reallocate that food, typically within 24 hours or less, back to food insecure individuals. So it's so powerful powerful because food waste is one problem. That is a solution to another problem food insecurity. It's so incredible how God can bring two problems together and solve a big crisis. In our state and really all over the country, this is being implemented.
Speaker 2:Your story is amazing because you from a place where you're a sheltered person, right, not, not? That's where you were planted, and then you found yourself in another place and you plant yourself in that place. I think it's incredible, the whole story of it. It is kind of a love and fishes fact. Do you know what I mean? Oh, 100%. It's like it's own parable, the parable of Grace Klein.
Speaker 3:It's like we get to live that manna from heaven. You know how they prayed every day and they needed the food and he would give the manna every single day and then it would disappear. And that's actually one of the biggest struggles, because every day we give everything we have away and then we say, ok, y'all sleep good tonight to our staff and we'll see you tomorrow and we'll do it again. And imagine going home at your job and your companies and saying, okay, we have no supplies for tomorrow, but somehow we're going to do it again. And we do it again and again every single day. And so because we have to give that food, turn that food over quickly to keep it food safe and to give people the best quality food options. So you think about you're emptying your whole organization every day. Your shelves are empty, your fridges are empty, your food's empty and you're believing God to do the impossible and he does it over and over. It's mind-blowing and it's scary it really is.
Speaker 2:It's a good riddle. I mean, I don't think it's. Yeah, I'm really laughing because my head was sore thinking about it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're living the miracle and you're knowing it every day.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I get to hear about the miracle, but you get to live it. So what would you like our listeners to take away about Grace Klein Construction and the Grace Klein community?
Speaker 3:I think for Grace Klein Construction, we would love for you to give us a chance to help you with your repair or remodel at your home.
Speaker 3:We want to do construction a different way, where it honors Jesus, it highlights the skills of quality craftsmen and just gives you the product that you deserve, where you can have a home that you're going to open and be hospitable to your community and use your home for good, and we want to empower you to do that.
Speaker 3:And for Grace Clown community, we'd love for you to come and volunteer with us, to invest in us, to donate your funds to us and just be a part of what God's doing. You have to come get a tour, you have to volunteer. It will change your life because you'll meet people that are different than you and you'll realize, hey, I want to be friends with this person and you would have never met them outside of showing up. We have the opportunity to say yes, and so I'm really encouraging you to say yes, to show up, to take the chance to do something different, to go do a food rescue, to just volunteer. You can go to volunteerfeedbhmorg, or, if you want to give, you can go to donatefeedbhmorg and you can be a part of this crazy story that's touching thousands and thousands of Alabamians.
Speaker 2:Well for our listeners and we've heard we've heard a little bit about how to get ahold of the Grace Klein community. But for our listeners who want to be part of the miracle, how can they contact Grace Klein construction?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's Jason at Grace Klein K L E I constructioncom Wonderful.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Jenny, for coming by and sharing this really uplifting story with me and with the listeners.
Speaker 3:Yes, have an awesome day everybody.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpbirminghamcom. That's gnpbirminghamcom, or call 205-952-0148.