Joe Kline / The BulletinOrganic apples at Natures General Store in Bend.

Debbie Sloan, owner of Nature’s General Store in Bend, said she would be closing the store after more than 30 years in operation.

“This is very painful,” Sloan said. “This store has been my passion for 32 years.”

Sloan announced the closure via her newsletter to subscribers Thursday. She said the store would be offering discounts before it closes for good. While she declined to give a date for the closure, she said it would happen before the end of the year.

Sloan, a Bend resident since 1976, opened Nature’s in 1983 with her husband, Gordon. Sloan said the couple was inspired by their daughter’s recovery from leukemia a couple years prior to 1983, and Nature’s was primarily dedicated to health supplements when it first opened. The store gradually added meat and produce and is now primarily a grocer.

Since 1983, the 5,200- square-foot store has been a staple in the Wagner Mall at NE Third Street and NE Revere Avenue in Bend. Sloan said the store has 11 employees. She added that Nature’s represents a local option for organic produce and meats, as well as health supplements that might be difficult to find in other locations. Sloan said Nature’s emphasized using local vendors, and the store’s website lists 46 Oregon-based food producers on its list of products.

“We would always grow by word of mouth when Bend was a smaller town,” she said.

Recently, however, increased competition from corporate grocery stores has made life more difficult for local grocers. Sloan said Natural Grocers, a natural food chain based in Lakewood, Colorado, opened two years ago in the Bend River Promenade.

She said Natural Grocers’ ability to offer lower prices than Nature’s and Whole Foods, as well as confusion regarding the two stores’ similar names, contributed to her store’s inability to keep up. Furthermore, Haggen, a grocer based in Bellingham, Washington, that emphasizes organic produce and local vendors, opened two stores in Bend in May in former Albertsons supermarkets, including one in the same shopping center as Nature’s.

Bend has more than 20 grocery stores or markets, ranging from local stores to national chains.

Nationwide, the largest grocery chains continue to grab the bulk of sales. The 20 largest food retailers in the U.S. took in nearly 64 percent of grocery store sales in 2013, up from about 40 percent 20 years earlier, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service.

As consumers seek more organic and natural foods, chains have responded by adding those products and also marketing their products as local, according to the agency.

“Bottom line is, just tough corporate competition,” Sloan said.

She added that, as Bend has grown, the traffic in town has encouraged shoppers to stay closer to home, further hurting established stores.

However, Sloan said that while increased corporate competition hurt the store, her customers kept Nature’s afloat until the end.

“I had a lot of people that really walked the talk: ‘Shop local,’” Sloan said of her customers. “I want to thank them with all of my heart.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7818, shamway@bendbulletin.com