Tea was the top sales item when this first Jewel Tea company store opened in 1901 at 643 E. 43rd St. in Chicago. Because it now handles thousands of items and has diversified into new fields, the company is dropping “tea” from the corporate name.
“What they were very successful at was kind of integrating themselves in the everyday lives of many, many Chicagoans,” Deutsch said. For years, Jewel’s chief rival in the Chicago area was Dominick’s, founded in 1925 by Sicilian immigrant Dominick DiMatteo as a small corner market on the city’s West Side. After a series of ownership changes, Dominick’s was purchased by Safeway in 1998 for more than $1 billion and the assumption of millions of dollars in debt.
“I would hope that things don’t change and prices don’t increase, because prices have already gone up,” said Ray, who lives in the Back of the Yards neighborhood. “It’ll just make it really hard for people to be able to afford to buy food for their families.”