The Independent Edition

Vine Farmers Market Owner: Jose Suentos Opened:  2013 Cooperative:  none Location:  930 N Vine St, Hazleton, PA Photographed:  December 22, 2018 Hazleton has a lot of independent Hispanic-focused grocers, but most are pretty small . Maybe that's why the Vine Farmers Market in northern Hazleton advertises itself as The Big Market. Vine Farmers Market takes up the basement of what likely was originally an industrial building at North Vine and 20th Streets. The focus here is produce, but there's also a butcher shop, seafood, and plenty of groceries. When we're inside, although the store is pretty large at somewhere around 15,000 square feet (compared to the other smaller Latin American stores in town), you can definitely tell you're in a basement. There are a few grocery aisles, plus a butcher shop/seafood counter as seen below, and then in the back we have a pretty large produce department including a walk-in refrigerator room for refrigerated produce and wholesale, w...

Tarone's Super Market Owner: Robert Tarone Opened:  1941 Cooperative:  none Location:  819 Alter St, Hazleton, PA Photographed:  December 22, 2018 How many grocery stores have you seen that have been continuously operating for over 80 years? Not too many, and Tarone's Super Market has even stayed within the Tarone family during that time. The 3600 square foot store was built in 1941 and still has its distinct 1940s character, closely resembling ACME stores of that time and others, especially in the ceramic tiling on the front. I'm not sure if it's always been orange, but the store certainly proudly displays its bright orange and green color scheme these days! The store is not really in a commercial district, it's just in a residential neighborhood north of downtown, but enough people seem to still travel to get to it that it's been in business for this long. I love the painted signage on the storefront! Heading in, we see a very classic grocery store with littl...

Mi Tierra Supermarket Owner: unknown Opened:  2017 Cooperative:  America's Food Basket Location:  304 E Diamond Ave, Hazleton, PA Photographed:  December 22, 2018 Welcome back and I hope you had a great weekend! Today we're going to be taking a look at one of the smaller supermarkets around Hazleton, of which there are several. Among many others are the Associate's Grocery & Meat Market and the Penn City Supermarket . This Mi Tierra, which appears to be loosely related to the stores in Queens , was previously the M&D Supermarket and opened in 2017 affiliated with Krasdale Foods, like the Queens stores. In 2022 or so, the store left Krasdale and joined America's Food Basket, along with the Hazleton Food Supermarket . There's a small parking lot for the store one door down from it, and the store is actually larger than it looks at a fairly hefty 8500 square feet. Obviously that's not gigantic, but it's bigger than the little convenience store it look...

MyTown Supermarket Owner: Luis Payano Opened:  2013-2023 Cooperative:  none Location:  46 E Broad St, Hazleton, PA Photographed:  December 22, 2018 Quick look today at the MyTown Supermarket in Hazleton, no relation to the MyTown Marketplace in the Hudson Valley of New York. In early 2023 this 3300 square foot store became the Enger Supermarket. Up next we are taking a look inside a small supermarket a few blocks north of here right here on The Independent Edition on Monday!

C&P Store Owner: Divyenkumen Patel Opened:  2001-2021 Cooperative:  none Location:  118 Chestnut St, Hazleton, PA Photographed:  December 22, 2018 Today's snapshot is a quick look at a former grocery store, one of those that probably used to be more of a full supermarket but became more of a bodega/convenience store over the years. The store was only 2,000 square feet, and appears to have opened under this ownership in 2001. It was definitely also open as C&P Store going back to 1996, but I can't confirm anything before that. However, I suspect it was open as a grocery store of some form for a very long time before that. The store closed in 2021. Our next stop is just a few blocks north here on The Independent Edition tomorrow!

    Welcome back from summer break! We are back in the Coal Region now, where we  left off  before the Harrisburg area, and in fact our first stop is just under 10 miles from Mahanoy City. Most of our time in this part of the Coal Region will be spent in and around Hazleton, with a few stops outside the city in White Haven, Freeland, Conyngham, and Berwick, from east to west. Hazleton has an interesting mix of supermarkets, ranging from little independent grocers that have been in business for a long time to newcomers from outside the city, and we'll be seeing eight interesting current and former stores in Hazleton before checking out the others. We'll be spending just under three weeks here, and then we're headed north. Head over to  The Market Report  tomorrow to check out our first stop just to the south of Hazleton!

Newark It's time for another look at the Universal Food Markets stores! The chain of stores has 10 locations under various names (Elizabeth x 2, Rahway, Newark, Orange, Hackensack x 2, Paterson x 2, Camden) of which 7 are Key Food-affiliated (the Hackensack Market in Hackensack and Super El Rey and Eagle Supermarket in Elizabeth are still not Key Food-affiliated). Newark, Orange, and Hackensack were previously Krasdale-affiliated. Newark was a Bravo, and Hackensack and Orange were CTowns. These days, those three are Key Food-affiliated Universal Food Markets joining older locations in Rahway, Paterson, and Camden. While there hasn't been a lot changed in this store, we see new banners temporarily affixed on top of the Bravo logos outside. Inside, there hasn't been much of a change other than replacing the lighting -- a much-needed improvement. This store is clean and well-stocked and seems to be a bit better-run than Orange, although it's quite small. The fixtures we...