Two specialty food stores beloved by Philly chefs are closing this month

This month, Philadelphia is losing two specialty food stores beloved by chefs and home cooks alike: West Philly’s Spruce Hill Provisions (4529 Baltimore Ave.) and the Italian Market’s Salt & Vinegar (905 S. 9th St). The closures are unrelated.

Spruce Hill Provisions opened in September 2021, while Salt & Vinegar opened in 2022, originally as a monthlong holiday pop-up. The shops were both “discovery stores” in industry parlance — highly curated spaces that allow consumers to find specialty products, especially locally made ones. Both were often the first retail shelves that local food entrepreneurs sought to place their wares on. They also functioned as community centers, bringing together small business owners and curious home cooks, and sought to highlight women chefs and cookbook authors. Salt & Vinegar in particular focused on products made by immigrants and people of color.

“Given everything that’s going on at the federal level at the moment, I have decided to devote myself fully to my nonprofit/social impact work,” wrote Spruce Hill Provisions owner Elizabeth Planet on Instagram, referring to her work as a coach for nonprofit leaders. “I have never taken any salary from the shop — anything the shop made went to the staff and to the business. It’s honestly an exhausting hobby, and I need to reallocate that energy to the nonprofit sector now.”

Spruce Hill’s last day will be March 31. Planet is looking for someone to take over her lease.

Salt & Vinegar owner and Edible Philly publisher Jen Honovic Herczeg also announced the store’s closure via Instagram. “My time has been split between Salt & Vinegar and running Edible Philly. During the holidays this past year, it became painfully obvious that I could no longer do both,” Honovic Herczeg told The Inquirer. “I was the bottleneck preventing both of them from growing to their full potential ... I knew I was going to have to put in more time or start doing online e-commerce, and it wasn’t a road I wanted to travel.”

Salt & Vinegar’s last day will be March 16; customers are being directed to Philly Food Works, an online grocer. Honovic Herczeg is also looking for someone to take over her lease. “I still have about 10 months left on my lease and a full shop of equipment and fixtures so it’s perfect for someone who wants to try something similar or take over what I was doing but without the risk of a longer-term lease or setup costs,” she said.

Spruce Hill carried local lines like Ox Coffee and Fishtown Pickles, while Salt & Vinegar gave Evie’s Snacks and Bellemille Olive Oil their first retail shelves. Recently, Salt & Vinegar became the home of Manayunk-based gluten-free bakery Flakely’s pastry ATM. Flakely is currently looking for a home for the ATM at another retail location in South Philly. (Full disclosure: Both stores carried my line of Hawaiian-inspired sauces called Poi Dog.)

Honovic Herczeg said her greatest challenge was to exist solely as a brick-and-mortar shop. “You are so affected by things like weather and the location and the foot traffic or availability of parking,” she said. “From speaking to other indie and small retailers, it is clear that you really need to have diverse channels and sources of revenue to make it work, not just a brick-and-mortar but also a coffee shop or a plant store or an active web presence for online orders and shipping. Just because you’re seeing a certain store or restaurant mentioned a lot on social media or in the press, it doesn’t mean they’re busy enough.”

The stores debuted during the pandemic, when home cooks were eager to replicate restaurant-quality food at home and became more curious about pantry ingredients and techniques. The future of shops like hers looks grim, Planet said. “Our first few years were so vibrant — people were excited to leave the house after COVID and pick up a treat at their local shop. But over the past year foot traffic slowed way down, and several of our neighboring businesses closed. The trend is not good.”

“I think it’s going to be a very tough road ahead for independent retailers both in Philly and across the U.S.,” Honovic Herczeg said. “The current economic climate and a country in chaos is going to make it very tough for consumers to be able to afford to and justify shopping small and locally, and that’s very scary.”

Still, Planet said, “I’m proud to have brought something nice to the neighborhood I live in and love. We’re a happy little stop along Baltimore Ave. I will miss that.”