For the first 10 years of my life, my mom and dad bought all our family’s groceries at a tiny store in a near western suburb of Chicago, from a couple named Tom and Louise. It’s hard to believe today that we bought all our meat, fresh fruit and vegetables, milk, bread and other grocery items from a place that’s half the size of a modern convenience store, but I guess Tom and Louise were great at inventory control.
Well, sometime in the early 1950s, an A&P supermarket opened up a couple of blocks away. Soon Tom & Louise decided they couldn’t compete, so they sold their building (it’s an apartment today) and opened a dry-cleaning place several blocks away. In fact, during the period between 1950 and 1960, tens of thousands of “mom & pop” grocery stores went out of business - but there was no reason for it.