South Philly Review

More than a century ago, produce vendors could be found scattered along the Delaware River selling their goods.

"It was the most horrible conditions down on Dock Street," Philadelphia Regional Produce Market General Manager Sonny DiCrecchio said about the stories he heard of the market's original location.

James P. Storey Jr., president and owner of the Quaker City Produce Co., called hawking his wares on Dock the "hardest work that I ever did in my life."

"Dock Street to here was a huge move because on Dock Street we had no jacks and no electric jacks," he said of 3301 S. Galloway St., the market's current home. "Everything had to be unloaded by hand."

That is, until 1959 when the market, which marked its 50th anniversary on Galloway June 16, was established to house dozens of vendors under one roof and eventually created the second-largest distributor of its kind in the nation. Come September, the new location in Southwest will be the nation's largest, besting New York's.

Then-Mayor Richard Dilworth and some businessmen developed the plan to relocate the industry from what is now Society Hill Towers at 200 Locust St. to Galloway, which was formerly a city dump, DiCrecchio said.

"They thought, 'We'll clean that up and we'll bring the entire food industry together.' They had their forward thinking," he said.

The market, which hasn't had a vacancy since its opening, is mostly composed of family-owned businesses. Some span generations from the Dock Street transfer, including M. Levin & Co., which started in 1906 when Michael Levin sold bananas out of a horse-drawn cart, great granddaughter Tracie Levin, who runs what is the oldest business in the market, said.

"It had to be done for space reasons alone," Levin said of the '59 move. "The same way the new move is much-needed. Our conditions here aren't great."

When the market was built more than five decades ago, it was not even considering 21st-century technology, Storey, who also serves as president of the market's board of directors, said.

"This market, this concrete down here, was not made for this big equipment and that has torn up this market so bad that we've been band-aiding it for 40 years," he said.

The roofs are collapsing and there are potholes that cause the merchandise to fall over, Levin said, adding what is known as the "cold chain" is broken when transporting produce from trucks to units.

"There's really no safety right now," she said.

While the company will continue to operate out of its warehouse at 326 Pattison Ave., where it ripens bananas, the new Southwest facility will bring safety, maintain the 55-degree "cold chain" throughout the handling process and, by expanding from two to four units, is expected to attract more customers.

"Hopefully, we're going to get new business for those who didn't want to come down to this market for safety or convenience," Levin said.

During the past nine years, DiCrecchio met with officials including Gov. Ed Rendell, former Mayor John Street and then-Sen. Vince Fumo to find a new location, but with the goal of keeping it in the city after New Jersey tried to lure it across the river.

The City offered a site at the Navy Yard and then at Columbus Boulevard and Oregon Avenue. In 2005, it was announced the market would go to the Navy Yard, but Rendell said two years later it would be too costly. Then, in '08, the market found a home in Southwest, breaking ground in September of last year.

The new facility at 6700 Essington Ave. will have 667,000 square feet of refrigerated space -- the largest central refrigerator ever built in the world -- adding 375 jobs and generating $1.6 billion in sales.