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“We don’t go by titles here. We just work. If I open the store and I have to sweep the oor, then that’s my title. If I help a customer to their car, that’s my title. If something needs to be done, we do it.” is attitude is in line with many hands-on owner/operators in the retail grocery business.
He’s certainly hands-on when it comes to picking the commodities they sell in their produce department. Harvestime Foods customers don’t have to sample items to know they’re fresh, because Dallas already has. He visits the Chicago International
Produce Market, located in the lower west side Pilsen neighborhood, six days a week to source produce for both stores. “I go to Pilsen every day, and I pick every single item. I taste everything to make sure. My philosophy is, if it’s not t for me to eat, it’s not good for my customers. I don’t care if I make money or not.”
With roughly 10,000 square feet of commercial oor space, nearly 30 percent is dedicated to produce, with the produce depart- ment generating between 30 and 40 percent of sales, depending on the season. “ is time of year (summer), we sell a lot of cherries and
watermelons, things that we’re not going to have in the fall and the wintertime, so right now the percentage goes up.”
Changing Demographics
Lincoln Square has a long connection to produce. In the mid-1800s, the area was home to truck farms owned by farmers of German and English descent. Lincoln Avenue, which cuts diagonally through the neighborhood, once was used by produce wagons to bring their wares to markets downtown. Celery was grown here and distributed widely, earning the area a reputation as the nation’s celery capital. Pickle factories and ower businesses ourished here, as well.
Over the decades, these early European populations mixed with newcomers from Asia and Latin and South America. It has also been home to many immigrants from Greece, Serbia and the Balkans, and the neighborhood still maintains strong German roots. As a result, the produce needs of the neighborhood’s population has changed over time, and these changes are re ected in the products sold at Harvestime Foods. “Most of the things are basic for every nationality,” says Dallas. “You
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