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Thursday, February 19, 2009

Chef's Market is closing

Chef's Market, the gourmet shop/off-premises caterer at 231 South St. since 1985, is closing Sunday.

"It got very difficult, to be quite honest," said Peter Georgiou, whose father, George, is an owner. "The streetscape project hurt us for six, seven months and immediately after that, they raised parking [meter] prices. The farmer's market didn't help. Every little thing took its toll."

Georgiou says the market will give back two-thirds of its space, and will be left only with a display showroom for its catering operation.
Posted by Michael Klein @ 4:40 PM  Permalink | 18 comments
18
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  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 5:38 PM, 02/19/2009
    I'm sorry to hear the city is losing another great business. Does anyone out there remember the Bagel Nosh in the 1600 block of Chestnut St? Maybe you can help me..what was the name of the bar over top of the Bagel Nosh?
    — betsbabe
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 7:17 PM, 02/19/2009
    I think it was the Blue Oyster
    — fgoreman
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 8:22 PM, 02/19/2009
    The Chef's Market was declining long before the street project. Still, what really killed it was the Whole Foods a few blocks away with parking. Better selection, better prices, cleaner. Chef's Market was a good local business for years, but wasn't going to survive there unless it offered something superior to what you could get elsewhere---like a Dean and Deluca or Balduccis. This wasn't close to that.
    — Palestra Jon
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 8:44 PM, 02/19/2009
    It really saddens me that locally-owned businesses are losing out to corporations all along this stretch of South Street. Empty storefronts outnumber shops now. Whole Foods wasn't cheaper, wouldn't order in products especially for you, and I doubt it employed workers from a prison release program. This store was a part of my daily life for 10 years, and I can't believe it won't be around soon.
    — Violette
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 7:15 AM, 02/20/2009
    Sorry you had a personal involvement with this business Violette, but the consumers have spoken. To me, Chef's Market used to be cleaner and have a wider range of products. While Whole Foods is a corporation, they certainly will order things for you and is considerably cheaper than Chef's Market for similar products. Their meats and fish are much fresher as well. People would have continued to patronize Chef's Market if it were better and cheaper. It wasn't. That's why they didn't keep the neighborhood people as patrons, for whom parking wasn't an issue.
    — Palestra Jon
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 8:14 AM, 02/20/2009
    Whole Foods was not the entire reason for it's demise. The Headhouse Square Farmer's Market on Sundays has really grown since it began two years ago. The quality of meats, cheeses and produce far exceeded anything available at Chef's Table...and it's all local/fresh.
    — kyle19125
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 8:30 AM, 02/20/2009
    Well Jon, Ya made me join the conversation. Did you ever TASTE the food at Chef's Market. For 24 years plus people lined up outside for their Thanksgiving Dinner items. New Years Eve yummies. Silver Palate cookbooks used Chef's Market recipes and credited them. The foods were not merely photo ready, they tasted great and offered , over the course of a month far greater diversity than anywhere else in town. While Whole foods mothership is in California, Chef's Market like Essene, is locally owned and operated.Cheffies and Essene's involvement in the area is based in the reality that it is their neighborhood. Neighbors get the neighborhood they deserve, housewives who like a romantic ideal shouldn't engage in recreational city planning. The ten years spent trying to get improvements on lower South Street resulted in the most disorganized, time and money consuming project I've ever seen.For most of the year, you couldn't drive, park or walk on the block. Dig it up pave it and dig it up again. Unbelievable. Furthermore on the city planning comment above, The Farmers Markets (If you look you'll see that they do stop on their way into town and pick stuff up at the wholesale markets by the case, to sell on the street) Do they pay a city business tax? Do they bring their stuff to town in refrigerated truck or styrofoam coolers? Do they employ anyone in the neighborhood? Mostly what bugs me about the Shambles/Head House Farmers Market is that it all began to provide fresh produce to underserved areas in the city, areas without stores selling produce. Darn shame about those poor folks in Society Hill who can't afford to drive their Volvos to Whole Foods and pick up their (locally grown) avocados and banana. Hello..Helping the Farmers hurt the local businesses. Folks here trying to make a living. The Gourmet-to-go era is gone. But Chef's Market: THANKS FOR ALL THE GOOD MEMORIES, YOU'LL BE SORELY MISSED! And, I will still be ordering their Thanksgiving Dinner.
    — Elvira
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 8:37 AM, 02/20/2009
    I am a chef at the market. I would like to dispell the notion that Whole Foods is cheaper & cleaner. I have shopped at both places and being unbiased as to my place of business, whole foods is not cheaper, plus I know our stock was definatly fresher. Chef's Market will continue to be around as a catering company, place an order and it will be delivered to you. They just closed to retail section of the store.
    — collings1276
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 8:50 AM, 02/20/2009
    Hey Elvira...you need to get your facts straight and not spew lies about some very hardworking individuals. The farmers who come to the Headhouse Market produce/grow their own products. Most are 100% organic, none live more than 2 hours away. Some are in the metro area, (Weavers Way is from Chestnut Hill). They work 12 hours a day, many of them seven days a week, to earn a living. Additionally, the Food Trust continues to serve all of those "underserved areas" of the city with 23 other markets throughout the area. Clark Park in West Philadelphia is a prime example. While Chef's Market may have been a great local market, the produce/goods brought in (from god knows where) had far less an impact locally. Step back and take a look at the bigger picture, if possible.
    — kyle19125
  • Comment removed.
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 9:04 AM, 02/20/2009
    For anyone still looking, the name of the bar over top of the Bagel Nosh was Blueberry Hill
    — leswin
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 12:55 PM, 02/20/2009
    Yes Elvira, I loved that place---20 years ago. In recent visits over a course of the last 4 or 5 years, I usually walked out without buying anything. The produce section, once great, was unclean and bad fruit not picked out. The gourmet grocery had the look of stuff left over from 10 years earlier. And there were noticeably fewer people in the store itself...even before Whole Foods opened. Maybe it is their change of emphasis to the catering operation (and since that is ongoing, you can still buy Thanksgiving dinner, you lazy thing), but the facts are that business there has decreased for some time and there is a reason for that. The street excuse is a bad one, since there was a time when people went out of their way to go there.
    — Palestra Jon
  • Comment removed.
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 5:24 PM, 02/20/2009
    Jebus! Why can't South st. have anything cultured? I've lived here for 6 years and the neighborhood is amazing - i've just been so saddened by the slow and steady decline of the iconic stretch of road. All along the way, new 'ventures' open that can hardly cater to tourists, let alone the community. The kicker is that it could be *so much better*, but no one cares enough to act. Chef's Market: I'll miss you, your local feel, and your cheese selection :(
    — scoot505
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 11:38 PM, 02/20/2009
    Hey Kyle...Chef's Market did not close for a single day for all its 24 years...rain, snow, blackouts, people still got their milk and eggs. Planning on shopping at the farmers market in the snow? The owners and employees worked hard morning and night, too. The Farm Trust is a wonderful, idealistic project to benefit Farmers. Shall we consider the market facters, the economic market factors? If city planners place vendors in the street outside of the businesses which pay for their space, their building, heat, water etc, what is the result? The street vendors make money and pay only to grow/create & transport their products. The shops pay for the cost of products (which includes growing) and the staff to help customers. And they contribute to the neighborhood's culture. But the shops are forced to be the biggest contributors to the street vendors, because they lose sales each time an item is bought in the street and not in the store. Shops' local staff is paid as are suppliers of big inventories, donations to local schools, houses of worship, and non-profits projects. Those products from"Who knows where were" carefully selected for their ripeness and flavor..even out of season. This was what the customers wanted in the good old days. Ever had a winter tomato? The bad fruits which silver tongued Jon mentioned (note, he is such a sweet talker) Were ripe and ready, not underripe, not wax covered, and if they weren't of good size or flavor, they weren't at Chef's Market. Their focus was always on quality. I suppose that Jon and Kyle are the ultimate food critics on this site, but all that bile is bad for the digestion. Everybody on South Street today appeared saddened to lose Cheffies retail store. As of Sunday it is no longer a retail shop, It is not the customers, its the economy guys. People will bet stepping away from
    — Elvira


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About Michael Klein
Michael Klein, the editor/producer of philly.com/Food, writes about the local restaurant scene in his Inquirer column "Table Talk." Have a question? Email it! See his Inquirer work here.
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