Businessman turns into “Milkman” every week, donates to community
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CARLISLE, PA (WPMT) — Gary Grant cannot leap tall buildings in a single bound, but that doesn’t make him any less a superhero in the Carlisle Borough community.
Grant, the owner of shuttle service Relax and Ride Carlisle, has taken a downturn in business and turned his time into a charity. Every Sunday for the past few weeks, with a small group of volunteers, Grant leaves half-gallon cartons of milk in plastic bags along fence posts at Carlisle area parks.
What started as 25 plastic cartons the first week at Memorial Park, grew to 40, then 75, and now this most recent Sunday, 100 bags at multiple parks spread across the borough.
Grant estimates it costs around $146.25 a week, which he says he gladly pays for himself.
“When you add value to people, it will come back to you,” Grant said. “I’m not doing this for the fame or any of that stuff. I really just want to add value to the community.”
Grant said he got the idea after seeing a Facebook post where a community in Germany was leaving bags full of food on city street posts. He soon after started doing the same thing in Carlisle.
Milk started flying off fence posts in minutes.
“People were taking three or four bags, and then I realized, they’re probably taking it because they need it,” Grant said.
As Grant’s milk operation grew, so did its profile. Giant Food Stores got word and donated $250 to his cause. Chick-Fil-A in Carlisle also found out about Grant’s charity, and donated 75 gift cards to go into random bags.
Grant estimates his shuttle service has probably lost “80 to 90 percent” of its regular business due to COVID-19. However, he firmly believes in the power of positivity and paying-it-forward.
“Sometimes I think to myself, what the heck am I doing? I said to myself, ‘You know what, don’t worry about it. You’ll get that money back.'”
Carlisle, and Cumberland County as a whole, recently entered the “Yellow Phase” of Governor Tom Wolf’s reopening plan. However, even when Carlisle goes “Green”, and more businesses start to reopen, Grant says he does not plan on stopping his Sunday milk sessions.
He hopes to expand the charity to more parks, and inspire others in neighboring communities to do the same there.
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