Many Hands for Haiti (MH4H) in Pella has announced their Mango Tree store location in downtown Pella will not reopen this spring.

Executive Leader of MH4H Tim Brand tells KNIA/KRLS News the decision to close the not-for-profit frozen yogurt shop was due to a few key factors.

“When we opened that shop, there were three main drivers,” Brand says. “Number one is we wanted to bring financial revenue for the ministry–that was a big deal for us, number two was have volunteers that can work and then in turn go down to Haiti with mission trip points, and number three was drive awareness.”

“Over the past twelve months, it’s really become clear that we really can’t do number one or number two as well as we wanted to–and if that’s case, then for us, it made a fairly easy decision from our financial resources that this wasn’t something we should continue.”

Brand adds, “We are a ministry, we run many, many programs in Haiti, we run a lot things around the state — I mean we still gave over $20,000 to local organizations across Iowa last year, and if this is something that becomes a drain to the organization, either from a financial standpoint or a time standpoint, we know we had to cut.”

He says it also was a tough decision emotionally because of the energy spent making The Mango Tree a reality.

“We all were just so emotionally tied to it, Brand says. “We all wanted to see it succeed, and so many people from this community gave a lot of really great effort and volunteered their time.”

Brand says MH4H is hopeful someone wants to continue the store on their own as an owner-operator, and says the location is for sale. Anyone interested in purchasing The Mango Tree shouldcontact Tim Brand at tbrand@mh4h.org or Ken Landgrebe at klandgrebe@mh4h.org.

The Mango Tree location in Oskaloosa also closed their doors on December 19th, with no plans to reopen. The statement from Many Hands for Haiti in reference to the closed store in Oskaloosa:

“Our vow was that if at any point this store could not bring in the resources to support itself or the ministry, then it was time to close it. We are at that point and know this is the decision God wants for our ministry.”