2nd day of vacation
Tuesday, July 8th, 2008I slept until just past 1pm (mind you I woke up at about 7AM to let the dogs out), it is 10:30pm and I am drinking a PBR and playing around on the Internets (via my leeched WiFi).
Yesterday was a pretty good day, Father Camilleri came along with Gina and I to Traverse City. We stocked up on provisions for the week at Meijers after having a good lunch at BD Riley’s Mongolian Grill. I bought meat and a couple of BBQ supplies.
I am going to smoke some Pork Shoulder and Chicken on Friday. I am also going to make some coleslaw as well.
We bought some sweet corn, which looks really good. But my father-in-law cooked some last night and it didn’t turn out too great. I am thinking it was underdone, but there was a leftover piece I had at lunch today and it looked completely done, but just didn’t taste right. Suck.
We also stopped at Folgarelli’s Imported Food Market in Traverse as well. All three of us commented almost instantly that it didn’t look nearly the same as last year. We had heard some rumor that some changes had taken place recently, but no one had a definite answer as to what the change was.
Well, apparently three years ago Folgarelli’s was sold, then some time in the last few months it went bankrupt. Seven weeks ago the original owners bought it back.
The three of us all speculated about what caused the bankruptcy. Gina took me to Folgarelli’s about 4 years ago (ie original owners) and the place was very cool. It had some good looking fresh bread, a great deli counter, a small but good wine selection, some Italian foodstuffs and a small freezer (pretty sure I remember a freezer) of stuff. They were known for their sandwiches.
The following year, things had changed up a little. It appeared as if they had expanded the foodstuffs and were carrying more than just Italian foodstuffs, there was Indian, Greek, and what I think was supposed to be a Mexican or Latin food section. There were more freezers. The deli case was still great and they were making sandwiches. They also started carrying some fancy olive oils, notably this FANTASTIC olive oil from Spain. It was in a 55 gallon drum to which they had hooked a pump. They had it bottled and ready to go. They had taken over the small building next door and expanded the wine selection.
Last year, everything was the same as the year before. We bought some more Spanish olive oil and had sandwiches, we also bought some deli meats and cheeses.
This year however, things were different. We walked in and the olive oil was missing, there appeared to be less foodstuffs available than the year before. The deli case looked a bit barren (there were less meats available than previous years). And the Boarshead logo was missing. The same number of freezer cases appeared to be there, but there was no bread in the window (they still offer it, but they were sold out).
While waiting for my deli meat I heard one of the clerks mention that they were waiting to get their liqour license back and that is why the little wine room was closed. The wheels were already turning once we entered the store, given the change in extremely visable items not being available (ie no 55 gallon drum), and the earlier rumor about some changes occuring.
We began to speculate about what happened. The best thing I could figure out was that a change in ownership had occurred, it seemed like the only logical reason why they would be re-applying for a liqour license, given that they were not a bar so the idea that they would lose it for selling to a minor seemed HIGHLY unlikely.
I inquired with the clerk about what happened while checking out, she informed me that they original owners had bought the place out of bankruptcy 7 weeks ago. That the original owners had sold the place three years ago. That filled in the blanks on why the inventory had changed up that one year.
Well, we LOVE Folgarelli’s and want to see it thrive again.
On a side note, there have been a couple businesses close here in Central Lake and Bellaire, MI. We speculate that they closed due to BAD management. However, there is an issue that all businesses in Northern Michigan are facing. The gas prices are forcing more and more families to forego spending their vacations and weekends up here. And those that do spend their time up here are also forced to spend less money.
I remember the conversation I had with the owner of the Bed-and-Breakfast where Gina and I spent out honeymoon, The Grand Victorian. Back in 2005, he was commenting on how the price of gas was hurting the B&B busines (and tourism in general), that was back when gas was in the $2.25 a gallon range.
Well, it is late here and I need to get to bed. 1pm is going to come to quickly.
Oh yeah, I got PHP, Apache and MySQL installed. So maybe tomorrow I will finally make some progress on one of my personal projects.
Laterz
