Evans Supermarkets
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Evans Supermarket at the Eastern Heights Shopping Center
on
U.S. 60 was one of five stores the company operated in Huntington.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HUNTINGTON — In 1924, Stanley L. Evans opened a
small grocery store in
Gallipolis, Ohio. In the first week of operation, the store grossed a
total of
$124. From that less-than-impressive start, Evans built a grocery
chain that by the late 1950s included 15 supermarkets
in Ohio, West Virginia and Kentucky.
In 1948, the Evans Grocery Co. opened a Huntington supermarket at 2445 3rd Ave.
It went on to own and operate four more stores in
Huntington — on 6th
Avenue at West 5th Street, 825 10th St., 2501 Washington Blvd. and
at the Eastern Heights Shopping Center on U.S. 60 at Russell Creek.
In 1959, the Evans Co. reported that in the previous
year its
five Huntington stores accounted for $7.5 million of the
company’s gross sales of $19 million.
The company’s offices and warehouses were located in
Gallipolis.
Food and other items were trucked into Huntington daily with the
exception of produce and other perishables. Each year saw
Evans spend millions of dollars buying wholesale produce
at the old Huntington City Market, making it one
of the market’s largest customers.
The payroll for the 180 employees at the company’s five
Huntington stores was more than $380,000 a year.
In 1961, the Evans Grocery Co. merged with Thorofare
Markets Inc., of Pittsburgh. The Evans name
initially was retained on the Evans stores,
with Evans becoming a wholly owned
subsidiary of Thorofare.
In 1967, Thorofare gave the Evans stores a new
name — Pennyfare Super Markets.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Note: This Article and picture appeared in the Herald-Dispatch Newspaper on Nov. 26, 2019.
-----------------------------------------------------------
[ Back ]