Customers of a Palmerton business who use their delivery service should plan for the holiday appropriately.

Country Harvest Family Market continues to offer its customers the choice for grocery delivery and pickup.

The business has the service available Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. There is a $5 delivery fee on all orders.

Country Harvest specifically encourages customers to order extra on their delivery order the Monday or Wednesday before Christmas and New Year’s Day to be set for the days they are not available to deliver.

The store’s delivery staff will not be delivering on Christmas Day or New Year’s Day.

Country Harvest has offered the delivery service since March, according to manager Chris Anthony.

“When we went into the state of emergency, we realized pretty quickly we had some older people that were of the higher risk population that didn’t want to come to work anymore, so we realized that we needed to provide some alternatives for people who are older, people who are homebound, people who shouldn’t be out,” Anthony said. “My wife (Sheri) and my daughter (Lydia) have really been spearheading the whole concept; it’s really old-school, it’s not online shopping, it’s the old pick up the phone and give us a call.”

Chris said the service has proved to be a success.

“It was really done as an emergency response to the coronavirus, and we continue to do it because of that,” Chris said. “We’re trying to do at least what we can to try and help those who are most at risk; those are the people who are utilizing the service.”

While the delivery service has slowed down some once things loosened up, it wasn’t that way initially, according to store co-owner Sheri Anthony.

“When it first started, it was super busy; we were doing it every single day of the week,” Sheri said. “There were a couple weeks where I was getting anxious (because) there were days we’d get like 15 orders.”

Sheri said the way it works is customers can call or text their order in for pickup or delivery.

“We take the address, phone number, write it up on a piece of paper, (and) we shop through the aisles, ring it through the register (suspend it), call them or text them (to) let them know order is ready,” she said. “We give them the total, (and) either they will come and pick it up, or we will take it to their house.”

Sheri said they follow proper social distancing guidelines.

“We wear masks and we have sanitizer, and we either take their check or cash, or we have a card reader (that takes) credit cards/debit cards,” she said. “We try and stick in the Palmerton school district.”

Sheri said they primarily deliver to Palmerton and surrounding areas.

“All people have to do is call and ask. We’ll do whatever we can.”

Sheri said she’s grateful to the customers who have and continue to use the service.

“We’ve been pretty lucky; we’ve met some really nice people who need a hand,” she said. “I really appreciate the people we’ve met, (they’re) very pleasant, thankful and kind.

“We love our customers, and we wouldn’t be here without them.”

The delivery service has proved to be especially helpful to those without transportation, such as Tony Lovuolo of Palmerton.

“It’s a hell of a walk with my condition,” Lovuolo said. “I’m disabled.”

A regular customer of Country Harvest, Lovuolo expressed his gratitude to Sheri and her daughter, Lydia, who delivered his groceries to him Friday afternoon.

“It’s going fine,” he said. “I’m grateful that you guys do this.”

To place an order with Country Harvest Family Market, contact Sheri at 610-737-0469.

Elsewhere, Mallard Markets in Lehighton has offered a similar program for its shoppers, according to its owner, KP.

“We definitely encourage people to call and order. Ever since the virus hit, we have a couple customers that do prefer to do it that way,” KP said. “We’ve been doing it ever since; we shop for them and they can just wait outside if they’re not comfortable coming inside, we’ll handle the payment inside, and we’ll drop it off.”

KP said it’s gone “very smooth.”

“No real complaints on it from all; a lot of people do appreciate that we have that option for them,” he said. “We actually don’t have a lot of people that really are still doing it, (but) back in March, we had a good amount of people calling in orders.”