Stanley’s closure leaves loyalists perplexed about buying produce
‘Seriously, what am I going to do?’ wonders customer
Hiromi Sogo couldn’t quite believe it when she learned Stanley’s Fresh Fruits & Vegetables had closed.
A regular for more than 10 years, Sogo arrived Monday afternoon to do her usual shopping and instead was handed a plastic bag that she could fill for free as the store cleared its inventory. Stunned and more than a little peeved, Sogo grimaced at the notion that she might have to buy pricier produce elsewhere.
“Seriously, what am I going to do?” said Sogo, 48, who lives in the Lincoln Park area.
Stanley’s abrupt closure last Sunday left many regulars mourning the loss of the 52-year-old Chicago institution, which drew shoppers from across the city to the busy corner of North and Elston avenues with its low prices, wide variety and family feel.
It also signaled that specialty grocers like Stanley’s, with its throwback handpainted signs in the windows announcing Red Delicious apples for 49 cents per pound, are becoming an endangered species in Chicago as deep-pocketed chains proliferate in a city known as a stronghold for independents.
Stanley’s has struggled since a second Mariano’s, a subsidiary of Kroger,
opened less than a mile away in 2015 and started pulling away customers, said Peter Panagiotaros, son of the founder. Though Stanley’s offered low prices, consumers won’t take the time to make a second stop for fresh fruits and veggies, he said.
“Shoppers have a whole different mindset these days,” Panagiotaros said. “They’re looking for time.”
Irena Gioia acknowledges that time — not enough of it — caused her to stop frequenting Stanley’s as much as she had when she worked at Home Depot across the street. After her family moved to the Mayfair neighborhood on the Far Northwest Side, she bought produce from farmers markets or at whatever supermarket happened to be in her line of travel.
“There are only so many hours in the day,” said Gioia, 47, as she filled her bag with Stanley’s free going-out-ofbusiness produce.
Competitors also are saddened by the loss. Stanley’s demise concerns Vanessa Dremonas, executive officer at Pete’s Fresh Market, which started in the 1970s as a produce stand on Chicago’s South Side. Now a chain with 14 full-service grocery locations and growing, Pete’s is part of a close-knit community of independent grocery stores in Chicago that keep each other on their toes.
“We’re not fighting against the big conglomerates, we are competing among independents who typically have stronger game plans,” Dremonas said. “It’s kept us all at our best.”
But the business model of independent grocers has been pressured by a slew of factors including rising labor costs and, for specialty grocers, lifestyle shifts that favor shopping efficiency. The growth of grocery delivery is also hurting sales at small stores that count on neighborhood foot traffic for business.
Pete Dallas, co-owner of Edgewater Produce in the Andersonville neighborhood, recalls seeing a JewelOsco truck pull up to the apartment next door to his shop to deliver groceries to the residents who live there, even though Jewel-Osco has a store literally across the street.
“It blew my mind,” said Dallas, who founded the produce shop 30 years ago with his brothers. “It says to me that convenience has trumped everything.”
Edgewater Produce, where 80 percent of the products are produce, has been pinched from all directions since a large Target opened to its west, a Whole Foods to the east and two Mariano’s to its south — all within about a mile of the shop.
While Dallas says the shop prides itself on the quality of its produce, which comes straight from the market or farm to the shelves, the big chains have gotten close on price.
After co-existing peacefully with the neighboring Jewel-Osco for years, Dallas has noticed that the supermarket, owned by Albertsons, dropped its prices significantly as competitors elbowed in.
“Some grocery items, I can’t buy them as cheap as they’re selling them,” Dallas said.
Edgewater’s workforce has shrunk by half, from 30 employees five years ago to 16 now, as business has declined. Dallas has shifted the grocery selection to more premium products, like higher-end cheese and vegan fare, to be more profitable.
Dallas credits the store’s survival to the neighborhood’s support of small businesses, but he worries that the challenging climate will squeeze out entrepreneurs and erase “any flavor to the neighborhood.”
“It’s going to become a copy — a Starbucks, a Dunkin’ Donuts, a Jewel,” said Dallas, whose shop is the kind where neighbors come in to chat about the Bears and the Bulls. “I feel sorry for the younger generation because there’s so much lost when the independent businesses don’t exist.”
Some produce stores are thriving despite the pressures.
Jerry’s Fruit and Garden, a 30,000-square-foot produce emporium in northwest suburban Niles, has seen business grow since new grocers have opened nearby because more shoppers are coming to the area, said president Richard Rieger, whose father and uncle founded Jerry’s 47 years ago.
Rieger worried he would lose his Asian customers when H Mart, a Korean grocer, opened less than a mile away, but instead his Asian business has tripled as people see his lit-up billboard or ads in immigrant newspapers and stop in to buy items like bitter melon, long beans and okra.
“We change with the times,” said Rieger, whose store draws people from as far as Milwaukee and DeKalb by offering a wide variety of ingredients useful in Polish, Middle Eastern, Indian, Chinese, Mexican and other ethnic cuisine. “You have to give the customers what they’re looking for, which is nice stuff at a reasonable price, and consistency.”
But Rieger believes Jerry’s, which is five times larger than Stanley’s, is bucking a worrisome trend that is likely to shutter other specialty stores.
“Stanley’s is just the start of it happening to lots of these smaller independents,” he said.
Competition wasn’t the only factor that led to the closure of Stanley’s. Founder Stelios Panagiotaros, also known as Stanley Peters, is 83, unwell, and undergoing kidney dialysis, said his son. “Yesterday he walked into the store and he was crying,” Peter Panagiotaros said Wednesday.
In addition, the neighborhood is on the brink of massive change as developer Sterling Bay moves forward with plans to redevelop 55 acres into an office, residential, entertainment and retail community called Lincoln Yards.
The family put the property up for sale in July, and it is being actively marketed to real estate investors, though no deal has been made.
Employees knew Stanley’s future was limited when the building went up for sale, and in recent weeks they noticed less merchandise coming in and the closure of the deli department, said a cashier who asked that her name not be used. But they were still surprised that it closed when it did.
Stanley’s, which kept its prices low by keeping margins low, tried to borrow more money to keep it afloat but was unsuccessful, Panagiotaros said. The family has been sustaining the business for the past twoand-a-half years, he said.
Stanley’s, which employed about 38 people, gave workers their last checks Wednesday. There was no money for severance, Panagiotaros said.
He said he isn’t sure what will be the fate of the quirky sign that looms over the property, of Stanley smoking a pipe while seated atop a watermelon propeller plane, but “we’ll probably keep it in the family,” he said.
Shoppers flocked to the store in the days after its closure was announced, lamenting the loss of a staple of the community.
“It’s one of a kind,” said Karen Ferrantella, 62, who lives in the Old Town neighborhood and had been coming to Stanley’s for more than 30 years. She particularly liked when the shop would display slightly older produce on tables outside the store at steep discounts, allowing customers to take a box of berries for under a dollar.
Chris Mosier, 38, traveled to Stanley’s every other week from his home in the Rogers Park neighborhood for its prices. The shop was perfect for stocking up for his vegan lifestyle, but there was also something special about supporting the small business.
“I loved seeing the handpainted signs in the window,” Mosier said. “There are not many places like this anymore.”