Jackson Jambalaya

Nice title, WJTV....

Well, sad to see this, but thanks Greg and Kathy McDade for the WONDERFUL job you've done with the old Sunflower store since 1996. You created a small empire with four stores in Jackson and one in Yazoo City. I'm guessing you guys are retiring and this was, realistically, your only option. Best of luck, godspeed!

Hate to see it, but can you blame them?

Was hoping it was Rouse's when I saw "Louisiana company"........ Oh well.

....." It's hard for this area to improve when every successful local business sells out to out of state buyers."....

Well, if I owned businesses in Jackson where theft, shoplifting, and armed robberies were the standard activity, I would sell out too given the right opportunity.

Yes, I know these crimes can happen elsewhere, but they tend to be more concentrated in Jackson.

Why couldn't have been Rouse's! Of all the grocery chains in Louisiana, wish it would have been Rouse's!

Putting your life's work into your business has to have some sort of payoff at the end, and lots of people sell in this situation. Criticizing the McDades for taking care of themselves after all the years they've taken care of others is silly. Don't want them to sell to an out of state buyer? Find a local buyer.

Wish it had been Rouse’s!

This is a normal business cycle. Owner/operators typically need to monetize their businesses for estate planning purposes. Perhaps we should lament that the days of multi-generational family-run businesses are gone, but as a general rule, seeing a business like this sold is a good thing for the owners. I don't know the McDades - I assume that they are at or past retirement age? I hope they make a truckload of money as a result of the sale. Here's hoping that Froogles does a good job running these stores.

The real problem is that there aren't enough McDades, Creekmores, Gary Butlers, Joel Bomgars, John Palmers, etc. coming up behind these businesses that are being sold. In a vibrant commercial market, the capital and wealth generated from businesses that are monetized is re-invested into new businesses, and the cycle continues and even grows. Alas, that doesn't seem to happen in Mississippi.

The Grocery business is tough. They have to deal with low margins, perishable inventory, high utility bills and large payrolls. And now these grocers also have to compete with a growing e-commerce channel. Independent grocers have to consolidate, sell out or die. I'm amazed McDade's made it work for as long as they did and I wish them well.

What's wrong with the title, 11:14. About fifteen years ago another Louisiana (or was it Texas) company bought up several Jackson grocery stores and closed them two years later. Was it Albertson's?....Maybe not. Anyway, its cyclical. Wish The Pig was back in full swing or somebody would compete with Kroger.

Cindy and Roger are going to reverse this trend. Wait for it.

Froogles operates cost plus 10% stores. This is kin to Vowell's CashSaver stores. Hope the new oeners don't mess with the plate lunches. Greg and Kathy McDade did a great job and stocked things like gumbo crabs. They knew their market and served it well.

Wonder what will happen to the liquor store in Maywood Mart?

Some NE Jax memories in the old Sunflower, Mr Bacon ,black eyed Susans in the deli..that whole corner really with Old Time Deli etc..

Why do you consider it bad that a local entrepreneur develops a business and when they decide to retire, they sell it to a larger business - out of state or not?

Actually, I would view this as a positive economic activity, not a negative one. Closing the store - probably their alternative - would be the negative. Expanding it with a new to the area marketing approach is a positive action.

12:10pm should be "its" not "it's".

Why worry about such things? All we need is a lottery and it will fix EVERYTHING!

We knew this was coming...Whole Foods and McDade's can't co-exist when they are literally 100 yds apart.

The Froogle's in Gulfport is an excellent grocery store. I do not know if it is part of this Louisiana group.

Several years ago Rouses wanted to come to Madison but as you can imagine, they couldn't put up with all of Mayor Mary's demands and BS.

McDade's in the Fondren literally will transport you back in time. The 50's. I hope that Froogle's don't mess it up.

I just can't believe that it's for sale. Its not like they were hurtin' financially.

If they didn’t want to bend the knee for Queen Mary then we’ll stick to Applebee’s and Sam’s club.

1. The decent Rouse stores are the original ones. Rouses came in and bought several stores in Baton Rouge and they all promptly went down in terms of quality and service. They are nothing like the NOLA stores. A Rouse purchase of McDade's would be a disaster for the McDade's stores.

2. Yes, we are better off when a local major business shuts down or sells out. We are better off without McCarty Farms and Jitney Jungle. Mac Haik tends to bring down the dealerships it purchases as well. Thank goodness HG didn't sell out to MH as it was going to do last year.

What do you think would happen if Verizon bought Cspire? You really think you would continue to enjoy those lower prices, nice customer service, or corporate support for local events? What do you think would happen to the good jobs? Do you really think the Clarion-Ledger is better off owned by Gannett? Gannett sucked all the profits out and now the thing is on life-support. Wait til one day it shuts down most operations here but for a handful of sales people and reporters to provide a wrap around edition for USA Today.

Sorry, we will disagree on this one.

Froogells is known as a cheap store chain. We will see what happens here, not that we can do anything about it.

Anyone know why the Roberts family down in Hattiesburg didn't take a swing at this? Their Corner Market stores are not so different than McDade's-- maybe a little bit better quality products, but not much. AND they're building a grocery store in downtown Jackson right now. Talk about a set of stones.

Where do these Cajuns stand on wine in grocery stores?

Jackson needs some Aldi stores. German efficiency at the finest level. Great prices too! Get rid of all of the silly laws which prohibit wine sales in grocery stores and we are rolling. ABC and the cronies who run it wouldn't like that very much though...

McDade's will be sorely missed. They run a good store and they are community-minded people.

Rouse's didn't come to Madison because they have a large wine/liquor department and couldn't sell that here.
The New Orleans Rouse's are the best grocery stores in the Southeast.
When will the legislature finally allow grocery stores to sell liquor?

In total agreement with you, Kingfish. The reports I'm getting from friends on the coast where there are Froogles are mixed, but they pretty much boil down to "they are well run and have some good stuff, but you won't want to buy everything there". Well, that's pretty much true of McDade's too, though they had carved their own niche pretty much from scratch with a little help from the old neighborhood Sunflower following. Our main store for groceries is the NE Jackson Kroger since they have so expanded and improved, McDade's fell to #2 after that though we still patronize them regularly, with the occasional trip across the street to Whole Foods, and every now and then Fresh Market. Never shop on the other side of I55 at Save A Lot by Cowboy Maloney, however, and if Froogles is that kind of store, we won't be patronizing it either.

@ 1:38
Corner market grocery store is going downtown. The foogles in bay st Louis is very nice. Probably the most friendly staff of grocery store chains I've encountered.

P.S. On the topic of Froogles "friendly staff", please note that the deal with McDade's is they keep all the employees. McDade's has "friendly staff" for the most part as well, but I'm sure there will be attrition if not some firings with the culture change. It'll be interesting to see how Froogles handles the local employment pool. Tricky. One regional chain, Albertson's, left here several years ago because, as I was told, they could find dependable/quality employees. McDade's and Kroger proved them wrong, but you have to know how to "play" the local market and this will be a very different market for them.

KF - if the option is McDades closing, or selling, I'll take selling any day and twice on Sunday.

Yes, we will disagree on this. You want someone local to own this business, bring them to the table. In the meantime while we all wait, the McDades want to retire. The offer their business for sell to whoever may be interested. I assume they took the best (maybe the only) offer on the table.

You use for your examples Gannett, Mack, and others. Frankly, I'm not sure it makes much difference if the Ledger is owned by Gannet, Hedermans, or whoever. The business model was dying and the Hedermans decided they wanted to cash it out before it went totally to crap. You think the Ledger would be a good paper today (magically) if it hadn't been sold to Gannett? It wasn't worth much when it sold so why would you expect it to be better?

I can't see any difference in the car business from the old "local" owners or the new "foreign" (although MH is from Mississippi) owners. Tell me what difference it has made.

My issue though was comparing the options - not your comparisons. The options in this case was selling or closing. I assume you would prefer four closed storefronts than having one of them damned LSU'ers corn dog eaters come into the neighborhood.

I've only been to the Froogle's in Bay St. Louis once, and it was good. As for Rouse's, I've been to the one in a new development off Juban Lane near Denham Springs, LA and it was excellent.

I wish we could have gotten a Claiborne Hill out of Picayune/Waveland. Great local grocery with awesome produce/meat departments and incredible prepared foods and poboys.

This just in from WJTV:

"McDaDeS IZ SeLlInG it's stores? ITS the best restaurant in town!"

Dear know-it-all at 1:07 PM Proximity to Whole Foods has NOTHING to do with this. The McDade family was ready to retire from the grocery business. I admire them for seeing to it that their employees were retained.
1:41 doesn't matter what "Cajuns" think of wine. They'll have to go by ABC regulations. Hopefully, Kathy will keep the Maywood wine store.
The McDade's name will remain on Northside and Fondren, Westland Plaza and the Eudora location will be Froogel's. As long as the McDade's stores keep the Jitney pimento cheese, my habits won't change - McDade's and Fresh Market. No Kroger for me.

Sad, but not too surprising. Economies of scale made it impossible for them to compete.

Looks like we're down to Whole Foods and Kroger. (Id Rainbow still viable?)

I hate to disagree with 2:26, but the wine and liquor sales was not a major roadblock. They were agreeable to build like Sam's and have their liquor store adjacent to the grocery store.

5:13 PM Rainbow filed for bankruptcy and has sold the building. They are not restocking and are hoping to emerge as some other type of business in the future.

Sam's has no liquor store adjacent to the grocery store. You may be thinking about Jackson Sam's years ago and that trashy, nasty 200 square foot wine store next door that featured Hiram Walker 10 High and Canadian Club.

I trust Kingfish is being factitious when he says we're better off without Jitney.

Meanwhile, we need more grocery stores that pay retired people to man those little carts with squares of toothpicked cheese and sausage. Those are what draw me....and the EBT crowd loves that. Watch 'em - They'll stand there with their kids and eat nine snacks.

I miss Jitney Jungle/Premier to this day. I rarely shopped anywhere else (other than Sack n Save) when they were in business.

Liberty Supermarket!!!

This is a big deal! Rouse's is a food service corporation and McDade's is a family grocery store. Corporations only care about the bottom line and when that location loses money, it will cease to exist. This is not a positive development. Kroger has Gluckstadt in its sights and will move here as soon as they can so they totally monopolize the Madison area grocery business. Family owned grocery stores are closing every day.

Six twenty-one, a.k.a. Don’t Be Fooled by Pink Steaks...Surely you meant to type “facetious,” not “factitious”? The latter is indeed a word, but makes zero sense in your sentence.

Ah, *ou sont les Jitneys d’antan...?* they are dearly missed...

Six twenty-one, a.k.a. Don’t Be Fooled by Pink Steaks...Surely you meant to type “facetious,” not “factitious”? The latter is indeed a word, but makes zero sense in your sentence.

Ah, *ou sont les Jitneys d’antan...?* they are dearly missed...

I worked for McCarty-Holman who owned Jitney Jungle and Sack n Save. I didn't work a store but rather corporate offices. McCarty Holman was an excellent place to work, they treated all employees and associates really well. I would still be there looking forward to retirement if they had not sold out and were still in business. McCarty Holman was one of, if not the largest privately held companies and employer in the state

McCarty farms never had anything to do with Jitney Jungle. Was a different family.

I have loved McDades being just what they are: A full service grocery where I can park and run in and not be there for 45 minutes to an hour after taking 15 minutes to find a parking place. The lunches are good and hiring the non-hearing is great and appreciated. I hope the new people don't want to change everything. The Maywood Mart store has been in basically the same order as when I first shopped there 60 years ago. Thank you to the McDades who have made my life better for a long time.

A couple of things on the local grocery store scene

1st - the McDades at Maywood Mart had the best staff, it was stuffy in there, but the cashiers were always pleasant. The staff over in Fondren were meh. The Fortification store had one little troll that was like 4'11" - she was an absolute idiot.

2nd - the Kroger's on 55 - the selection is good, the staff is meh, but the parking is horrendous. If you are not in there before 7am - you can hang it up. The Kroger's in Madison on 51 is my second choice, hate they closed the one on County line, it was a great 2nd option for quick and easy groceries.

3rd - now it makes sense on why Rouse's never came, I forgot all about their liquor portion of the store.

4th - the legislature should allow grocery stores and pharmacies to sell liquor. Walgreens sells liquor everywhere else might as well allow them to do it here.

P.S. and the legislature need to eliminate ABC too. Hell, they are collecting taxes on the front end by bootlegging the liquor to the liquor stores with a 30%+ markup and then we are paying sales tax on the back end.

The McCartys owned McCarty Farms.

Screw all that noise, if someone was wise enough to invest in a Publix franchise here they would be swimming in money. Anyone want to go in? $$$$$$$$

@12:36
It's not a franchise investment. It's a company expansion plan. They are not here yet for a reason. They would like to be in Texas and New Orleans. Larger markets.

Publix has huge wine sections in there stores. Always going to be a problem in Mississippi.

Public won’t come without wine is what I am told.

Says 7.25 AM: "Corporations only care about the bottom line and when that location loses money, it will cease to exist. "

And if a local family owns a grocery store that loses money, what do you think they would do? Whether it is one investor or a publicly-traded company with thousands of investors, investors are investors.

In fact, in some cases it might make sense for a large grocery chain to let some money-losing locations continue to operate because of economies of scale with their purchasing power or distribution network that would benefit other locations. A small operate would be much less likely to benefit from these factors and would be more apt to close a store quickly if it is unprofitable.

It is doubtful that Publix would come into the Mississippi market - too small. Kroger and Wal-Mart have the Jackson market wrapped up. I know, I know...a lot of you hate Wal-Mart, but the fact is they have a huge grocery business, and in a relatively low-end demographic like much of Jackson, they do very well.

12:49: I don't know much about the NOLA market, but it would be a possible target for Publix. Publix might try to tap into the DFW area, but they won't touch Houston/Central Texas. HEB would crush their skull. Nobody beats HEB.

The grocery store situation here totally sucks. I hate Kroger. Kroger is the big dog around here and so no incentive to offer better prices or service. Then there's Walmart. So many times they are out of what I want. Not all the Walmart stores carry the same items either, its almost like shopping in a flea market. But Walmart doesn't care.

I miss Publix. Best service. When I lived up in Wisconsin there's a warehouse-style grocery called Woodman's which is not a national chain. Also great service, prices not much above Walmart. In Texas they have HEB. Up in Chicago they had a nice chain with a great salad bar. How come no supermarkets here have salad bars?????????

You know what those markets have in common? They are privately and/or employee owned. They have much more incentive to do better than Kroger and Walmart. We'll never have that in MS.

Ophelia: Surely you didn't mean to screw up and post your comment twice, back to back. Please pardon my fast typing and misspelling.

What actually made no sense was Kingfish's remark that we are better off without Jitney, but you instead chose to seize on a misspelling. And your haughty attempt at French is entirely to bourgeois for this blog.

3:33, the McDade's in Maywood Mart has a salad bar. Also, a store called HEB sounds antisemitic to me...

Don't be fooled yes they do have a liquor store. You obviously just haven't been inside it. Nice try though.

Two words.

Piggly Wiggly

I used to work at The Maywood Sunflower before it was sold to McDades. When Charles Glover sold his interest in the store to the McDades, his partners, the Helton family retained an interest in the new McDades. I wonder if the Heltons are finally selling out or if they will be involved in the new store as well?

@3:33 pm

Apparently you haven't been to Kroger in many years. They do have a salad bar, rather good salad bar and have had for a long time. I do agree that Kroger is sticking to the consumer price and selection wise. Many items that I bought there for years are no longer carried. Also, the new Scan, Bag and Go is a total disaster. They want me to do their work for them while they cut jobs for checkers and baggers. If I'm going to do this then I want a discount!

When I was a wee lad back in the 60s my mother shopped at a New Deal grocery store on Hwy. 80 and Robinson Road extension. Right next door was White's Grill where I had my first can of beer. That was the nastiest tasting stuff I had ever had.

However, the second one was purty good!

My wife and I have been happy and loyal customers of the store on Northside Drive for more than 15 years. When some folks complain that Kroger stocks a greater variety of items than McDade's, I am reminded of the motto of Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery, from A Prairie Home Companion's mythical Lake Woebegon: "If you can't find it at Ralph's, you can get along pretty good without it."

I have found that McDade's stocks just the right amount of the right kinds of things, and that if it doesn't stock it then I probably don't need it. There's also a fair amount of eccentric stuff that you won't find in the local chain stores (McDade's carries the daily print editions of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times; our favorite spaghetti sauce, Cajun Power, from Abbeville, Louisiana; a superior five-layer caramel cake brought in from Clanton, Alabama; and a number of different chicken salads and seafood dips). The McDades support local charities, such as the Gleaners, and I have been in the store on more than one occasion when I saw store personnel reach into their own pockets to buy a meal from the store's hot bar for a homeless person who came into the store. The check-out lines move fast, and whenever a line starts to form with three or four people, they open up more check-out lanes. The staff is courteous, they'll carry your groceries to your car for you, and no one asks you to scan your items or bag your own groceries. If the McDades are ready to move onto new adventures, then I wish them well. It's been my our pleasure to shop at their store.

The Froogles in Gulfport has the best 2-dollar bbq sandwiches around... MUCH better than anything available in godforsaken Hinds County... Just sayin'.