The sign has been up for a while, sparking curiosity among residents in New Ipswich.
But the wait is finally over with Sonny’s Market in the NeWest Mall expected to open for business on Friday, March 27.
Owners Arthur and Barbara Kalioras, who have operated Sonny’s Main Street Restaurant in Henniker for the last 14 years, purchased the shopping plaza more than three years ago. On one hand, it was an investment, but the Kalioras’s also wanted to see what would be the best options for it.
“What does the town need? What does it now have?” Arthur said. “So we talked to people and asked what they need.”
Having been restaurant owners for many years, the logical choice was to open a new place to grab a bite to eat. But with the New Ipswich House of Pizza already in place, Arthur thought a different operation would be more beneficial.
“The first thing we thought of was a grocery store,” he said.
For Barbara, she’s used to her husbands many business ideas.
“We’ve been together 34 years, married for 30, so he just says the idea, and I say let’s do it,” she said.
The plans were put in place a year ago, but with necessary upgrades to the space – new air conditioning/heating, flooring, LED lights – and difficulties scheduling work to be done when needed led to a longer process than first expected. Plus they both work full time at the family restaurant and live in Concord, so it’s been a lot of back and forth.
“The hurdle was what’s the best way to do it,” Barbara said. “Since we had the building, we had choices.”
“It’s taken longer than we thought, but we wanted to do it right,” Arthur said. “It’s going to be right from the beginning. We didn’t want to cut any corners.”
But with Friday the tentative date for opening, it couldn’t come at a better time with people all over the region looking to stock up on supplies amid the coronavirus pandemic. Just last week, the toilet paper and disinfecting wipes sections were stocked full, but that likely won’t be the case once Sonny’s opens for the first time.
The Kalioras are hoping that opening a grocery store in town will alleviate New Ipswich residents from having to travel far distances to get all their essential needs.
“We’re going to have everything that a large grocery store has, just on a smaller scale,” Arthur said. “You’ll be able to do all your grocery shopping here, whether it’s for the day, or the week.”
“One-stop shopping,” Barbara added.
There is a large section for fresh produce and fresh meats will be in the cooler, although there will be no meat or deli counter. They will have chips, cookies and crackers, canned goods, along with soda, wine and beer, including a selection of craft brews. There’s large refrigeration and freezer units as well as all the essentials and cleaning products one would need. They plan to have some local products as well, but those are still being figured out.
There won’t be any hot food, as they don’t want to complete with the House of Pizza. The hope is rather that people will go for some groceries and get a pizza to take home for dinner.
The Kalioras’s understand that opening a grocery store is a lot like opening a restaurant where early on it’s getting a feel for what people are looking for.
“The first three or four months will be ‘what do you need?’” Barbara said.
The thing they’re most looking forward to is meeting new people and building a relationship with them.
“We want to know our customers, who lives downtown, what history do they have here,” Barbara said.
The name came from Barbara’s father, who started calling his son-in-law Sonny.
“All of my friends and my wife’s friends started calling me Sonny and I all of a sudden became Sonny,” Arthur said. It seemed like the perfect name for the restaurant and it carried through to the grocery store.
The Kalioras’s also plan to open a hardware store in the plaza, but the plans for that will begin once the grocery store is up and running.
Sonny’s Market will be open seven days a week, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. For more, visit www.facebook.com/sonnysmarketnh.