The easy, and difficult task of grocery shopping in old-time Phoenix


Let's time-travel back to 1917 Phoenix, Arizona and go to Bayless Grocery Company. Some of it will be wonderfully easy, and some of it will be terribly difficult. Do you have your list? Let's go!

We just walk up to the counter and ask for things - no need for a shopping cart. How easy! But this is where it gets difficult - you have to tell the person behind the counter what you need, specifically by name and size (or weight). Speaking for myself, this would be extremely difficult because I'm so used to walking up and down aisles at the Walmart Neighborhood Market and picking things up I really can't tell you the names, especially the brands, of things I get all of the time, and weights and measures are still kind of a mystery. How many quarts in a hogshead? Pecks in a bushel?


Let's start with getting some honey, sugar, tomatoes, and coffee. There doesn't seem to be a size for the honey - is fifteen cents for a comb a good price? Twelve pounds of sugar sounds like a lot to me, but it's only a dollar. I guess we need to specify cane. I've heard of sugar cane, it comes from Hawaii, right? But am I getting twelve pounds of canes or twelve pounds of ground-up sugar? I guess when the clerk comes back with it and puts it on the counter we'll find out. This is gonna take some time! How about 100 pounds of cane sugar?

Tomatoes I understand, and presumably there's a case that we can look at. No? Well, I guess we'll see how many are in a case when the clerk carries it out to show it to us. I hope you didn't plan to do anything else today! And we can get some Wedge coffee. I wonder if that's a brand name? Does coffee come in wedges? At least I know what three pounds is.


Let's get some potatoes. I guess I mean spuds. Fancy spuds? Fancy sweet potatoes? You know, between the 100 pounds cane sugar and the fifty pounds of Daisy flour, it's gonna be a chore lugging this stuff back to the ranch!

But I'm wrong again, we just leave the store empty-handed and it's delivered to us. I wonder if the delivery is free? It should be, at these prices, gul-darn it! Put away your wallet, we don't pay anything, at least not right now. The total for the day is written down on our tab, and we will pay at the end of the month, or after payday, or sometime. Did you give careful directions to the ranch? Down by the wash, by the big Saguaro cactus, where the old stagecoach stop used to be.

I think next time I'll skip going into town for groceries, I'm exhausted!

Thank you for the encouragement! If you want to see daily pics of my adventures on my recumbent trike in suburban Phoenix (just for fun, of course!) you can follow me on buymeacoffee.com/bradhall, and you can buy me a coffee if you'd like to!

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Comments

  1. kirkdooleyMay 14, 2024 at 9:29 AM

    Having spent almost five mortal years working for A.J. Bayless (1978-83), I can hold it up as an example of why you should NEVER leave the family business to your children. When the founder (A.J. himself) passed away, his widow was named the chairwoman, but the company was run by his two sons, Arthur and Joe -- who promptly ran it into the ground. It was eventually sold to some venture capitalists, who finished it off completely. (Eddie Basha, who was an old friend to A.J., bought the A.J.'s Fine Foods gourmet grocery chain, which is the only remnant of the company that exists now.)

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