From a small shop to a huge network: how immigrants from Russia founded a famous supermarket in the USA

Stop&Shop is a popular supermarket chain. It is now part of the Ahold Delhaize Group, a large Dutch giant with almost 6800 stores in Belgium, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Romania, Serbia and the USA. But it all started with a small shop opened by immigrants from the Russian Empire. Read more about this story told the publication Boston Globe.

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History Stop & Shop

The store's origins date back to the 1890s, when Solomon and Gini Rabinovitch opened a grocery store in north Boston, Massachusetts. The store was then called the Greenie Store.

It was a simple time when the Rabinovich family started to develop their business, and most people shopped daily at the grocers near the house, because they did not have a refrigerator.

Over time, the business began to gain momentum. In 1914, the Rabinovitchs opened their first economy grocery store in Somerville, Massachusetts. The company was founded at the same time, but at that time it was called the Economy Grocery Stores Company. Four years later, the store switched to a new self-service supermarket model. The second store opened later, in 1914, several stores opened a year later, and by 1917 there were already 15 stores in the chain, writes Wikipedia.

Initially, stores only sold groceries, but meat, grocery items, dairy products, and some frozen foods were soon added to the mix. They were the pioneers of the modern grocery store, selling all kinds of food under one roof.

The youngest member of the family, Sidney Rabb (born Sidney Rabinovich) took over the business in 1925 and ran it for 60 years. Along the way, changing the name to Stop & Shop (1942), he founded the now-defunct Bradlees discount store chain (1961) and opened the first supermarket in Pembroke (1982).

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In 1959 Stop&Shop already had 100 stores. In 1961, Stop & Shop bought the now-defunct Bradlees department store chain in Connecticut. Later, in the same 1960s, they bought the ORBIT'S chain of three properties and merged them into Bradlees.

Stop&Shops in Massachusetts opened in the suburbs and in retail areas. Stop&Shop appeared in Connecticut and Rhode Island in the early 1950s, New York in the early 1960s, and New Jersey in the late 1960s. Around the same time, the company began selling non-food items.

In early 1985, Stop & Shop bought Almy's, a small chain of discount stores. The remaining Almy stores closed in 1987. After Sidney's death in 1985, his son-in-law Avram Goldberg took over as chairman, and Goldberg's wife, Carol, was named president.

The Goldbergs, faced with a hostile takeover by the Dart Group in 1988, turned to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. for protection, and KKR bought the company for $1,2 billion in a leveraged buyout.

By 1990, Stop&Shop was operating in Connecticut, Rhode Island, as well as Boston and Springfield, Massachusetts, with one store in New York State. Stop&Shop went public again in 1991 and remained so until the Ahold takeover five years later.

In 1994, Giant-Landover began its northern expansion by opening stores in Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey under the Super G brand.

Ahold still owns the store, and although the brand had to leave some states after several unsuccessful attempts to develop business there, now supermarkets continue to thrive in their native Massachusetts and many other states.

The Stop&Shop network has survived all corporate changes and has become part of the spirit of the region. Now there are 415 stores in the network.

You may be interested in: top New York news, stories of our immigrants and helpful tips about life in the Big Apple - read it all on ForumDaily New York

History of the Rabinovichi

The Rabinovich family emigrated from Malestovka (Russia) with their children in 1891 so that their eldest son would not have to join the army. According to one version, the family changed their last name from Aaron to Rabinovich to make it easier to leave Russia, the website says. Jewish Heritage Center.

They chose the surname Rabinovich to signify Jewish origins. After an unsuccessful attempt to enter Palestine, the family traveled to the United States instead. Upon their arrival in New York, the Jewish Immigrant Aid Society sent the Rabinovichs to Boston. They quickly opened a small grocery store on Salem Street there.

In addition to the Stop&Shop, the family has a long history of participating in numerous social and religious events. Known for their philanthropy, the Rabinowitz family has helped many organizations, including Beth Israel Hospital, which named a building after them, and Brandeis University, where they were the main sponsors of the Alumni Center. Various members of the family were active in associations and organizations, from the Boston Public Library to the United Jewish Benevolent Organization of Boston.

The descendants of the Rabinovichs still live in Boston, but already under the name Goldberg.

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