Quality Market Opens A New Fresh Store
in Thunder Bay
by Scott A. Sumner
www.thunderbaybusiness.ca
When you drive down Golf Links Road in Thunder Bay and look up on the hill across from the Thunder Bay Country Club golf course you will see a spanking new attractive building that is the new home to a Quality Market “ fresh” store. The 11,000 square foot structure has been the subject of much study and hard work resulting in Thunder Bay’s newest grocery outlet with a twist. The well known and liked Stezenko family of Thunder Bay with brothers David and Dan are the masterminds behind the project which is result of following their dreams!
"I was almost born into the grocery industry. My dad, Yuri, had 49 years in the industry when he retired from Safeway. In the late 70’s I wanted to begin working with dad in the grocery business but I was too young. They allowed me to do the landscaping and keeping the sidewalks and exterior of the building clean etc," notes David Stezenko, co owner of Quality Market with his brother Dan. "That was in 1978 at age 9. In 1982 when I was 13 I had grown tall enough and began working inside one of the stores. My brother started at MacDonalds Consolidated, a wholesaler in 1982. All three of us were working in the grocery business."
In 1988 the opportunity came to the Stezenko family to break away from the corporate giant and to do something on their own. They did a business plan and jumped at the opportunity hook, line and sinker at Centennial Square. "We had learned the value of a good hard day’s work
from an early age from our dad and mom. At the start of our own operation we had to bump and grind and learn what it was going to take to be an independent grocer. The early years were difficult. You don’t earn success just by opening the door. There are so many lessons to be
learned and mistakes to be made. When you work for a large corporation they take care of so many things for you. As an independent you have to take care of everything yourself- the accounting, payroll, legal everything is done here. As a small company you don’t have the staff or working capital so you set goals and try to accomplish one at a time," said David Stezenko.
"Slowly but surely we started to get our roots in the ground and in 1995, we had the opportunity to take over another Safeway store at County Fair Mall. We jumped at that as well because it offered us more buying power and we could blanket the region with advertising instead of just around one store. We have been fortunate. Slowly we have inched forward. The community has embraced us and we decided a long time ago there were certain values we would put before
profit such as being involved in the community and offering great customer service. We firmly believed if we did that one day we would get them to come. We haven’t reached the dream of having customers come in floods but we have grown every year and have very loyal
customers." Today shopping patterns are unique according to David Stezenko. Even your most loyal customers may go in for a quart of milk at a close location. "Hopefully we are offering the customers more as we go along. Every Monday we have a management meeting and discuss what lessons we have learned and how we can improve. As a small company we can change
this week. A larger company may take months to make a change." said David Stezenko.
"We have been dreamers for years and believe in setting goals and always shooting for those goals. My brother and I are out in the country looking at other stores that have done well all the time and we have no problem in copying what fits with the demographic of Thunder Bay. We will do what the consumer wants and needs. For the last ten years we have been looking at this idea of a fresh store concept. Canadians are eating healthier every day. That is really what is driving this idea of our smaller new store," said David Stezenko.
"In the new store 65 to 70 % of the foot print will be made up of fresh food. In a traditional grocery store, that is only going to be 25 to 30%. We will sell groceries but only the staples.
Say with cereals we will have 30 varieties instead of 200. In the fresh food section, it will be phenomenal. It includes fresh prepared food, meat, deli, pastries, dairy, cheese and the list goes on." The new store will take more labour per square foot because of the fresh nature of the product. The two current stores are 24,000 to 26,000 square feet in size. The new store will be 11,000 square feet in size. "We started the planning for the new store 5 years ago with intensive planning beginning 2 1/2 years ago. We broke ground in the early fall 2009 and should be opening the doors in 5 weeks. We went and talked with a lot of business people in Thunder Bay and asked a lot of questions. One fellow broke the city down to ribbons and what drives traffic," said David Stezenko. "One ribbon not developed yet was the golf links road. It will be 4 lanes starting next year from the Harbour Expressway and Red River Road. The city staff feel it will be the busiest arterial in the city The traffic patterns are from living place to work. Our new store will be close to the University, College and Hospital. The location means the property will be called Campus Hill, such as Intercity or River Terrace is called. We will have a good audience of those who work in the area."
QualityMarket is currently working with a nutritionist to develop meals for those coming out of the hospital after a procedure when many people are not ready to cook yet. "We are working
on low sodium meals and will open early enough so we can serve the early morning shift to pick up their lunch or snacks for the day. Our staff will be there are 4 to 5 am getting ready for a likely 7 am start," aid David Stezenko. "People will be able to get a meal and bring it home. We started doing this about 1 year ago and it has grown exponentially. In this area we have a great staff who loves creating new dishes. Life is busier today than decades ago and there is not always time to create a meal and sit down and eat it. We are working towards new solutions. When we built a new kitchen here we don’t have a fryer which is unheard of. We don’t have that as an option at Centennial Square. It is all about offering healthy choices."
The new store will be state of the art. The exterior lights are run by solar and wind power to help the environment and ROI for the operation. They will have LED lights and the most efficient
refrigeration systems. "It is expensive to build a store like this but we have been dreaming about this and looking at the numbers and everything seems to make sense. We know it is the right pace and time and people in the part of the city need to be served. We are looking forward to becoming their grocer," said David Stezenko. "We have confidence in Thunder Bay. Thunder Bay had done recession for the last 15 years so we know recession. I think that is why we
have resiliency as other communities, The LU and hospital have been a real blessing to the community. The wood industry should come back. I believe Thunder Bay is on the right track and is a great place to raise a family."
General Contractor on the site is Les Farrow and Sons. "They are tremendous people and have worked so well with the myriad of sub trades. It is also great to work with James Collie, project manager at the Northco Group who will own the building. We have been riding the wave with them. The engineering that went into the site is phenomenal. We work with a grocery store consultant of which there are only two in Canada. The perimeter of the store is all equipment. Tim Horton's is our neighbour and they produce a lot of traffic which is good," said David Stezenko. "Wherever we go in Thunder Bay people stop and encourage us. It seems Thunder Bay is proud that a small family business is moving ahead in times when it is usually the
corporate giants doing so. The encouragement is adding a huge amount of wind in our sails. It gives us energy and a lift and we can’t wait to get open."
Dan Stezenko, co owner of Quality Market started working in the grocery industry for MacDonalds Consolidated for 6 or7 years when he was in high school before getting into the family business. "My dad was a Safeway manager. I was in the H B Commerce at LU. It took
me six years to graduate as I was working but I did graduate in 1992." smiles Dan Stezenko.
"Our new Campus Hill store is set to open the end of July. It will be a different kind of a store. We call it a fresh store common in the bigger urban areas, but never done in a city like Thunder Bay before. It is not so much a grocery store but a place that specializes in all the fresh side of the business. It will include all your meat, produce, deli items, prepared foods and vegetables. It will have a full compliment of grocery but on a smaller scale. The big change in a normal grocery store is that 75% of the space is devoted to dry goods like canned and 25 % is for fresh products. In our new store it is reversed. 25% will be dry goods and 75% o fresh products. For
example we will have a salad bar that will have breakfast items in the morning and change through out the day to make salads for lunch or take home for your dinner. There will also be a large selection of meats," said Dan Stezenko.
All the produce in Canada comes into two food terminals some 8 cityblocks in size in Canada- one in Vancouver and one in Toronto. Whetherit is coming from Chile, the USA or Canada it comes to this central location. They in turn sell to every one else." We have a buyer that
buys for only 4 customers including 2 in the Maritimes, 1 in Southern Ontario and for us locally. All he does is buy the best product at thebest price. We are not tied to any one vendor. Let’s say somestrawberries come into Canada on Tuesday, he buys them that day, putsthem on our truck and we have it back to us Thursday or Friday. We senda truck down empty each week and bring it back full. We get the freshproduce direct this way," said Dan Stezenko. "Our number one priorityis quality. For customers who are interested in the freshness andquality of the product those people gravitate to our stores. They havelearned our produce is superior. The other guys have contracts for a year and are limited to their selection. The larger stores send their product to Winnipeg and it is off loaded and then reshipped to the local stores which means they may get it the next Tuesday or Wednesday. If it is highly perishable, it is a big thing. We can say our stuff lasts longer because of this buying approach."
The new Quality Market Fresh has been several years in the works. "We firmly believe it is a great location for several reasons. We ae close to the hospital and will have a lot of prepared food and florals that people can bring to the hospital. Also outpatients who need meal already prepared will be able to get them here. We are also closeto the large population at the university and River Terrace wheremany live and may want to shop with us. Also, we are at the
corridor to Murillo and at centre city. The city will soon develop a four highway in the area soon. It will make it easy to get in and out.
There will be two entrances off Golf Links Road and one from Oliver" said Dan Stezenko. "It has been a difficult process building a new store, a bit of a learning curve but we did our homework and got the right people. We have good partner with
our developer, the Northco Group and thank all the people who have
helped us. All of our sub-contractors have been very dedicated. It has been a good learning
experience. We are hoping it will turn to be a good retail location inthe end and do very well. It is a huge investment but we believe in thecommunity, and always have. We believe in keeping it local andthe money regenerated in the community. All of our 120 employeesspend their money in Thunder Bay. We have a lot of vendors that arelocal say for our Italian or Chinese foods or our bread. We sell a lotof their products from over 20 different suppliers. We have seen
some regeneration of the economy here. I think the store will be an
asset to the community."If you are looking for high quality and great fresh items, this is
where to find them. "We have seen it happen in bigger cities in Canadaand the USA. People today don’t buy all their items in one spot.They may want a different location with their fresh items. Papertowels are paper towel or detergent is detergent but when you aretalking about picking out a really good T bone steak or fresh cheeseor salads for your family, people want to go somewhere you can trustto get good products all the time. We believe there is a market
for this. They may not do all of their shopping here but buy theirfresh items," said Dan Stezenko. "It will be a very, very nice lookingstore that is well laid out, modern, classy and provide everything thatis the best that we can offer. The interior of the store was designed
by Doug Horvath of Vancouver, one of only four people inCanada who do this. My wife Jennifer designed the exterior of thestore and colours."
Quality Market is not staying in their County Fair store. "All of our staff is moving to the new location or our other store.We would have preferred to stay here but the landlord has other
plans." states Dan Stezenko. It was fun to visit the new Quality Market Fresh when it is
opened. I am sure it will be a great addition to the community!
