Bisiness.
Customers browse in
the 36,000-square-foot
Produce Palace.
Produce Palace is an earthly
paradise of fruits, vegetables
and everything in between.
FRANK PROVENZANO
SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
13
- ack in the mid-1960s, Mark Yarsike was
yanked out of class at the yeshiva to attend
to a pressing family matter.
His father Sam Yarsike, formerly of Sam
& Sons Fruit Market, which had a big deliv-
ery service, had just bought 2,000 cases of
strawberries that had to be sold — pronto.
So, going door-to-door, the 7-year-old helped
his father sell every last strawberry to resi-
dents in the Dexter-Davison area of Detroit.
Produce, as he says, has always been in
his blood.
Around the same time that Mr. Yarsike
was learning the three Rs, Sam Katz, a Pol-
ish-Jewish immigrant, was building Sam's
Fruit and Vegetable Fair on Campbell Road
in Royal Oak and writing the first chapters
of a rags-to-riches story.
Thirty years later, Mr. Yarsike, 38, and
Mr. Katz, 62, found each other. Together, they
started Produce Palace International in War-
ren last August. Their combined know-how
is transforming their enterprise into one of
the largest and most diverse produce mar-
kets in Michigan.
"We've already passed the break-even
point," said Mr. Yarsike, an Oak Park resi-
dent. "We've been advertising and we're see-
ing new faces every day. I can't even guess
what our sales figures will be."
The key, he said, is to keep the 36,000-
square-foot market as varied and changing
as the seasons. In late summer, Produce
Palace sold hundreds of flats of impatiens,
geraniums and petunias, as well as plants.
Soon, citrus fruit from Florida will be avail-
able. Then, it's plums and nectarines from
South America.
Produce Palace, located on Dequindre, just
north of Twelve Mile Road, carries an as-
sortment of more than 60 produce items,
along with prepacked peeled baby carrots,
chopped vegetables, and salad mixes. That's
months (he also maintains a stand at East-
ern Market), Mr. Yarsike has been hiring and
training a staff to work in seven departments,
including meats and seafood, baked goods,
flowers, gourmet groceries and prepared
foods. Each day, the management team
works and reworks the various produce and
deli displays.
Experts contend the entire food industry
is undergoing a fundamental change. Small
grocery stores are unable to compete with the
wide range of products and pricing at super-
markets.
After the second wave of European mi-
gration in the late 1940s, Mr. Yarsike ex-
plained, there were as many as 300 produce
markets in the area. Today, there are only
about 15 large-scale produce markets in the
metro area, and of those, less than five are
owned by Jews.
The days of a produce market in every
neighborhood is gone, but a loose federation
of market owners meets daily at the Produce
Terminal at Fort and Springwell streets in
Detroit.
"We face each other every morning," Mr.
Yarsike said. "It's a very competitive busi-
ness, but we always try to respect each oth-
er."
Mr. Yarsike is one of the youngest owners,
but that doesn't mean he has the least expe-
rience. On the contrary, he's been a regular
at Eastern Market since he was 4.
"My parents couldn't afford a babysitter,
so they'd take us down to the market with
them," he said.
Since then, he's been a mainstay at East-
ern Market. Within the next six months, how-
ever, he plans to sell his stand — the largest
at Eastern Market — because he doesn't have
the time to tend to it. A typical day begins at
2:30 a.m. at the Produce Terminal or East-
ern Market, where he buys from the latest
Mark Yarsike:
its impact on the amount and Produce man.
quality of produce he must buy.
"Last week a case of lettuce cost $12; this
week it's $30. There's a shortage because the
lettuce in central California has been picked
and the crop in southern California isn't
ready," he said. "What do you do when you
won't sell a head for more than 99 cents?
You've got to take a short-term loss."
On a humid Thursday in late August, Mr.
Yarsike recalled, rain was forecasted for the
following weekend. So, he bought a few ex-
tra cases of beans and radishes.
"I figured it would be too wet to pick beans
for the next several days," he said. The rain
came. Many other produce markets guessed
wrong; Produce Palace was well stocked in
beans and radishes.
According to Mr. Yarsike, those who suc-
ceed in the produce business seem to share
several qualities: an appreciation for natur-
al growing conditions, an ability to act on in-
stinct and the energy to work with little sleep.
In many ways, it seems that Mark
Yarsike's partnership with Mr. Katz was
sheer destiny. Not only do they share the
same date of birth, but years ago, Sam
Yarsike and Sam Katz had planned to open
up their own market. They never did. In-
stead, Mr. Katz opened Sam's Fruit and
Vegetable Fair, which closed three years
ago.
1 004 Tit,.
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