Grocery Life January 9, 2015

Grocery Life January 9, 2015

By Tom Butler

Good afternoon from Butler and Bailey Market. I hope everyone is staying warm this week. Looks like we are not going to get a warm-up for another few days but at least the sun is out today.

As you might imagine, bundles of firewood and artificial fire logs have been popular items this week. We used to get our bundles of firewood from a supplier in North Carolina but now we have a local supplier. John, who lives just down the road from the store, started his own firewood company last year. He and his family shop with us so when he approached us to sell his wood, we jumped at the chance. We always prefer to deal with local folks. Also, with all the new restrictions on where firewood comes from and the bad pests that can get imported into our area within the wood, it is nice to have a supplier that uses locally harvested wood. I think if you need more than a bundle of firewood he will deliver a load to your home.

His company name is Darn Good Firewood and here is his email and phone number if you need some wood delivered.

Darn Good Firewood Phone: 865-712-9561 email: darngoodfirewood@gmail.com 

Staying on the wood and fire theme, we now have a locally made, all natural lump charcoal. It is perfect for big green eggs as well as other charcoal burning grills and smokers. We used it throughout the holidays here at the store to sear beef tenderloins and were really pleased with the quality of it. It comes in twenty pound bags, cost about ten dollars less per bag than the green egg brand, and best of all it’s a local product so you may want to give it a try.

The representative from our grocery wholesaler was in the store earlier this week. He wanted to meet to discuss the results of 2014 and to help us strategize about 2015. We all chatted awhile about our successes and failures and what we can do better. Grocery talk can be pretty boring as you would know by reading this blog.

The most exciting topic our rep and us discussed was how many bags of food we sold and donated during our “feed the hungry” food drive during the holiday season. His company is behind the design of the program so they are really interested in determining the success of it. He is the rep for numerous grocery stores in several states and he told us our store was far and away the most successful with the drive. He thought the combined total of the rest of his stores still would not equal our success.

I tell you that to tell you this. Give yourself a big pat on the back for being such a giving community. All we do here at the store is facilitate the program. The credit goes to you for the success of it. I don’t have the final totals from Second Harvest as to how many pounds of food we sent to them but I think it’s going to be around four thousand pounds!

Last but not least the president is coming to town today. I bet my wife and mom just cringed when they read that last sentence wondering what I was going to write about him. Well no worries, that’s all I’m going to write about that… You will have to read between the lines.

Thanks for letting us be a part of your community,

Tom Butler

Respond to:tom.butler44@gmail.com

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Butler and Bailey Market

7513 Northshore Dr.

Knoxville, TN 37919

(865)691-8881