New York's Family Grocer
The Story of D'Agostino Supermarkets
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From pushcart to pantry staple in the city that never sleeps
New York’s Family Grocer tells how a neighborhood name became part of the city’s daily rhythm. Patsy and Nicholas D’Agostino arrived from Italy, learned their trade on crowded sidewalks, and opened a small shop in 1932. The idea was simple. Treat people well. Keep the shelves full. Make everyday shopping feel easy by offering meat, produce, and dairy in one location. That approach turned one store into a local favorite and, in time, a chain that stretched across Manhattan.
The book brings back moments shoppers remember, including the jingle “Mr. D’Agostino move closer to me”. The move from street stands, pushcarts, and market stalls to bright aisles. Fresh produce piled high. A butcher who knew your order. A name on the corner that signaled quality on the walk home from the subway. Ads and window displays gave the stores a friendly voice, and family ownership carried that spirit for three generations.
Archival photos, ads, clippings, and interviews show how immigrant networks raised capital, how storefronts doubled as social spaces, and how a surname became a trusted brand. Readers watch the shift from street markets to self-service, then into an era of gourmet counters, convenience, and delivery. Labor, supply, and competition tested the company, and the city kept changing around it.
Led by the D’Agostino family, the company tried new ideas and kept what worked for shoppers. The results include wins, losses and chapters that feel unmistakably New York. At its heart, this book is about work and pride and the promise that a small business can grow without losing its touch. It shows how food shopping shapes daily life and how a family brand becomes part of the map of a city.
From the shelves of the grocery store aisles to the pages of this book, this biography of a New York city grocery store, drops us into immigration history, Italian American history, food history, business history, and the life story of a great city. Everything has a history worth telling and this book on D'Agostino's surely demonstrates that.—Hasia Diner, Professor Emerita, New York University
Poignant, incisive, and full of judicious insights into the inner workings of the American grocery business and the immigrant entrepreneurs who transformed it, this deeply researched, beautifully written book stakes out the intersection of ethnic identity, business history, and the culture of food in twentieth century America. Investigating New York City’s most famous upscale grocer, Schmitz explores the transformation of D’Agostino’s and similar businesses from immigrant fruit sellers to successful supermarket chain. New York’s Family Grocer demonstrates how D’Agostino’s Italian roots and its founders’ gruff, earthy style—the very ethnic authenticity that originally labeled it lower class and a public nuisance—eventually became the secret of the market’s appeal to upscale consumers. This book will make major contributions to business history, the study of ethnicity, and the politics of food in the modern United States.—Bruce Schulman, William E. Huntington Professor of History, Boston University
