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Goodbye to the corner store

Tuesday, October 2 at 6:00 PM

This Speakout has not been edited.

By Mike Archer

I’ve been following the on-again, off-again merger between Whole Foods and Wild Oats. The latest is that the FCC opposes it. So do I but for different reasons. On the other hand I don’t understand why oil companies are able to merge in the blink of an eye but much smaller grocery companies are not. Perhaps it has something to do with President Bush having a background in oil and not groceries.

Grocery stores have changed a lot over the last two generations or so. Its all about the “economics of scale” this country has been consumed with the past 30 or 40 years. True, grocery stores are better today because of it in some ways. Better selection of foods and lower prices, at least adjusted for inflation we are told. It is difficult to argue against lower prices when the typical middle class budget is stretched to the breaking point. But I think some sleight-of-hand is involved. Soda pop was ten cents. You can still buy soda pop for ten cents but if you want it with real flavoring its called “gourmet” now and costs a dollar. The grocery shopping experience has changed, too. It’s worse.

The first store I remember, in the 1950s, was Nick’s on the corner of 32nd and Tejon in Northwest Denver. It was technically Nigro Bros Grocery. Nick ran it with his two brothers. Nick was the GM, his younger brother worked the meat counter at the rear of the store and his older brother took care of maintenance detail. But they were all cross-trained, so if one was out sick things still ran smoothly.

The store was smaller than the produce department of today’s large chains.

But it was very efficiently laid out, everything always neat as a pin. There was plenty of variety as far as I could tell. I remember my mom sending me to the store for syrup and being slightly overwhelmed by the number of brands, three of them, and the two different sizes.

Nick was a happy-go-lucky sort of guy and obviously enjoyed working with the public. He was kind, also. Our family mostly just made ends meet in those days and Nick would occasionally carry us an entire month. I’m sure he did the same for others and I’m equally sure it was a strain on the store’s finances. He was not just a store GM but also a friend and neighbor; more cross-training! I don’t think King Soopers would carry anyone for a month these days.

I remember my mother buying meat at Nick’s — pork chops, chicken, shoulder steak and hamburger. I can’t swear to it, but I’m fairly sure they all tasted better then than they do now. Nick’s brother would always give me several feet of that wonderful white meat wrapping paper as a bonus for drawing and making things. If I ran out, he would always give me a few feet, even if we weren’t buying any meat that trip. Soup bones, all we wanted for our dog, Snuffy, were free.

I had my first job at Nick’s, sweeping the floor at closing time, which was 5:00PM. Nick and his brothers had family and they wanted to spend time with them. Nick’s older brother, Carmen, showed me how to sweep but I was very short and none too coordinated. He was also quite fastidious and was the one responsible for the store always looking so clean and neat. You never tripped over something that had fallen off the shelf. Pay for fifteen minutes work was a ten-cent bullet ice-pop that tasted great and lasted a long time. Hey, Carmen, wherever you are — it’s 50 years later and I’m still short and none too coordinated!

In the late 1950s we moved a few blocks away and started going to bigger stores — Musso’s and Polidori’s. Polidori’s on 34th and Shoshone was a very nice store. The cheese and meat department was to die for and would hold its own with the finest of today’s delis. Some good things do stick; the Polidori family still makes sausage and it is every bit as tasty as it was so many years ago.

The Mussos were our next-door neighbors — Mike and Louise. They made items such as ground red pepper, pepperocini and olives, bottled them in their home then sold them at the store. I doubt they needed a wall full of licenses to do that in those days. They were the entrepreneurial type and also ran the neighborhood tavern, the Alpine Inn.

The first King Soopers was on 38th and Irving, if memory serves. That was the beginning of the big chains in Denver. In the early 1960s I spent most of Saturday with my Uncle Johnny traveling to all the northwest Denver grocery stores picking up the ad specials and carefully collecting trading stamps, Blue, Green and Gold Bond. Gold Bond were the favorite, for a reason to which I was never privy. Besides Polidori’s and Musso’s we went to: Shutto’s, Miller’s, Piggly-Wiggly, Furr’s and the really big King Soopers in the Lakeside shopping center. I remember Uncle Johnny’s fascination with the electric light door opening mechanism. It made for a long day, but the magazine racks in each store were an oasis for me.

Today in the Denver area the number of pure stores has been pared down to Safeway’s and King Soopers. All the smaller chains — much less the mom and pop “corner stores” — are long gone. So is the cross-training. We used to take time to chat with the clerks, the butcher and the check-out attendant about neighborhood goings on. Now, its get your groceries and move on.
You can see the trend, of course. The stores are getting bigger and bigger, less and less personal; shopping is more of a means-to-an-end and less of an end-in-itself experience. Everything is “super this” or “mega that” today.

The big stores are part of our never-ending quest to save time. But it often seems we are saving time to just save more time. These days we never really have time for anything else!

I recently read about a Brobdingnagian vending machine called “Shop2000” dispensing everything from aspirin and sushi to soap and eggs.

Say goodnight, Nick.

Mike Archer is a resident of Golden.

READER COMMENTS

Mike,
You're so right. Our country is in a big,big mess. Those good old, days you reminise about are gone. Don't we wish things were different in our country? It's pretty scary.

Posted by jl on October 16, 2007 07:46 PM

jl - I'll take Nick over Shop2000 any day! Nick smiled, talked. And Shop2000 doesn't give free popsicles or drawing paper to the kids!

J W - I agree with you 100% except that some of the unbelievable damage Cheney, Bush and their fascist hendchmen have wrought is probably irreversible.

Amazing in just seven years - the trashing of the constitution, the systematic destruction of the middle class and corporate welfare (how about a $15 billion handout to the oil companies in 2005 while they are making record profits; wow!), Russia already a superpower again, our hard won reputation as a good and decent world power - in shambles, the biggest deficit in the history of the world and the biggest growth of the federal government in history - some conservative LOL!, Katrina, raping the environment to sate the money lust of the capitalists, the disaster in Iraq, the rise of Iran and the further destabilization of the Middle East...did I mention the arrogance, the lies - the LIES!, the secrecy - an energy policy made behind closed doors with the CEO of the biggest corporate fraud in history...the list goes on and on, J W.

Posted by Mike on October 16, 2007 04:20 PM

Shop 2000 is this getting to be the robot
generation, not needing a Mr. Nick.

Posted by jl on October 9, 2007 01:12 PM

The sooner we get rid of bush and his entire crooked administration, the sooner the United States and the rest of the world can start recovering from all the damage this inept fool has done and caused every since him and his crooked administrations stole both elections here in the United States.

Posted by J W on October 9, 2007 11:07 AM

Red Ferrari ?must be now that they have the tall huge building on 38th. I'll check out C.M.

Posted by jl on October 8, 2007 09:11 PM

Red Ferrari must be now that they have the tall huge building on 38th. I'll check out C.M.

Posted by jl on October 8, 2007 09:09 PM

Old man Leprino had a gorgeous red Ferrari Daytona. You could here it starting up blocks away.

You might consider signing up on classmates.com...

Posted by Mike on October 8, 2007 11:30 AM

I'll bet that in this day and age they couldn't change parks names as easily as they did in the 70's. We lived on 38th Osage and didn't get permission fron the people or petitions. We were a block away.How things have changed. I visited Liprinos family member in Applewood back in 92 for a womens fellowship. I love that area. There's
good Italian restraunts still down 38 further west. I guess we'll not ever know the juicy story..like the tabloid. Inquiring minds want to know :)

Posted by jl on October 8, 2007 10:54 AM

Yes, Caninos! Wow, forgot all about them. Leprinos did very well, indeed...but that is a long story not for a public forum; inside scoop interesting. We were neighbors to them in Applewood for awhile.

Was sad to see Columbus Park renamed but I guess the parks belong to the people who live there at any given time.

Posted by Mike on October 7, 2007 04:39 PM

Hi,
Cute story. Duffy? A vague memory:)
oh, Caninos sausage off 38, they and Liprinos have done well for themselves, good products from Denver. I remember when the park was Columbus and then changed to La Raza. I think other parks were changed also.

Posted by jl on October 7, 2007 02:07 PM

Hope you enjoy the vid clip. They weren't the friendliest folks on earth - but not many of the old Italians would be considered 'lively.' They worked hard, took the New Country opportunity with great seriousness.

My friend Greg and I would mow lawns in the summer. We'd take the money to Polidori's buy ricotta, capacale maybe a chunk of parm cheese and a loaf of bread. Then we'd go to Gerald's Drug on 33rd & Tejon for Duffy's sodas - Gerald had them in one of those old ice containers and were they cold and delicious. We'd haul everything over to the knoll behind the Bryant-Webster library, carve the cap with a pocket knife and have a small feast for about $2. Those, my friend, were the days. :)

Posted by Mike Archer on October 6, 2007 06:10 PM

I googled Polidoris and got alot of info to click on. Lots of photos from the family, history, and recipes. Made me hungry now I gotta go cook. :) I'll come back later I remembered some other company., off 38 near Jason st? It 'll come to me.

Posted by jl on October 6, 2007 05:57 PM

Hello, I'm going to visit that web site right now
:)

Posted by jl on October 6, 2007 05:40 PM

Hi -

We used to get our ricotta from Franghi's on W 38th right across from Potenza Hall. They folded, gal told me they got tired of all the break-ins, vandalism. :( It's pretty good now at Vinnola's on 38th and Wads, though...

Polidori was on 34th & Shoshone. They have a website and a sort of interesting video clip when they were featured on local news on time. Polidorimeatsdotcom.

Posted by Mike on October 6, 2007 05:33 PM

Hi -

Polidori was on 34th & Shoshone. They have a website and a sort of interesting video clip when they were featured on local news on time. Polidorifoodsdotcom.

Posted by Mike on October 6, 2007 05:31 PM

Hi Mike,
Yea it was lil Pipinos. How funny your gram..well 2cents in those days were alot,and you get used to one price. Even now,
what? you went up?:) Those bakeries remind me of the Seinfield episode 'marble rye.:)I remember the store near H. M my friends lived near by. I'm going to have to take a ride down there & see if anything changed. (and buy some fresh goat chz)
Wasn't that it? Polidoris ..38th close to Federal a nail shop next door? Oh, good pizza was Subway 38th. them days. I don't know about now.

Posted by jl on October 6, 2007 05:09 PM

Yes, Little Pepinos! Was nice place...I think Carbone still down on 38th but not sure. When I was a kid they had a small bakery in the alley off 34th and Quivas. My Gma sent me down every Saturday for two loaves of twist bread. I remember the fit she had when they raised the price two-cents a loaf! Good thing I didn't understand Italian. :) Richard Carbone ran a little bakery for 2-3 years where the Bay station was cater-corner from the firehouse on 36th & Tejon. I heard he lost it gambling...Carbone's sausage was the best. Others were good, especially Polidori's - but not as good as Carbone.

I was also thinking of Shiola's on 39th @ Pecos and Por Eds on 38th that we used to go to on the way home from Horace-Mann.

Posted by Mike on October 6, 2007 02:22 PM

Mike,
Yeah that's the name, and there was Patsy's and pagliaccis and the other real fancy, white linen Italian restaunt on the corner of....
?? where was it? Little Pepinos is that the name? and yea Smaldones were nice :)
they were friends of my late husband. Gaetanos had the best pizza, I think Hick now owns it or sold them all. (don't quote me). Is Carbones still on 38th (haven't been that way lately) we'd go by there to buy fresh
goat cheese from Trinidad or to the other
Italian deli closer to Federal they had goat cheese to.Then Carbones broke off and opened a deli on Wads-Florida Lombardi's,
best sausage ther too. I think Carmine passed. As customers we loved that family,
that was the last stop for following goat chz
:) The suburbs are not the same. Thanx.

Posted by jl on October 6, 2007 01:47 PM

Hi, jl -

The store was perhaps Cerone's? There was also Mancinelli's on W 32nd. Mack's 5 & 10 was fun on 33rd & Tejon. The local beer joints were the Blue Goose and the Dog House Tavern. I remember going to the Dog House with my dad, playing pinball with one of the Smaldone bros. He seemed like a nice fellow. ;)

Posted by Mike on October 6, 2007 09:15 AM

Mike,
Those are good memories we lived on 38th Osage there was an Italian grocery store in the middle of the block , that was as convenient as a corner store. I recall all the stores you mentioned.
Now it's Super Wal-Marts, and Mexican
grocery stores and Taquerias.
Soon, 2007 will be a memory.
Good letter.

Posted by jl on October 5, 2007 11:41 PM