(From left): Sam and Mel are followed by their sons Joe Jnr and Joe Snr, both named after their grandfather.

Welcome to Piedimonte's.

Set amid some of Australia's trendiest and most gentrified inner-city suburbs, this one-stop shop and continental melting pot is a comforting constant for its many regulars.

It's a monument to an era gone by, to a simpler time, and to a migrant family who started with nothing and built an empire.

Walking the floor always fills Carmelo 'Mel' Piedimonte with pride. He plans to do it for the rest of his days.

But Mel knows his family's pride and joy needs to change. Everyone does. Except, well, some of its customers.

Ravioli. Cannelloni. Panettone. Provolone.

When the Piedimonte family began selling Italian food in Melbourne 60 years ago Spam or maybe a smear of Vegemite with pre-sliced white bread was the lunch of the day.

They never imagined they'd create a store that would one day have a cult following.

Let alone one where some among that cult don't want things to change.

Mel and his younger brother Salvatore were tormented in the schoolyard. What they were eating. Where they came from. Their accents.

"We took all the rot that was given to us by the Aussies," Salvatore 'Sam' Piedimonte chuckles in a thick Australian accent. Remnants of his mother tongue only start to surface when talk begins about Milano or the perfect tortellini.

"The usual thing of dagos and wogs and fighting, and all these names — we took it all, gave it back and moved on.

"I made it my business to become an Aussie."

And he's made a hugely successful business of it.

At just 16, after working for another family's supermarket, Sam approached his father Giuseppe with his own vision.

One where their passion and the fruits of their labour would stay in the family.

"Dad was working at the mill, my brother was working at Red Robin making stockings and socks, my mum was a dressmaker," Sam says.

"I said, 'Dad, I want to get into business. I'm not going to be happy working for somebody else and not earning the money I'm worth'."

And so it began.

It was 1958, Fitzroy North, Melbourne.

Today houses in the area fetch a median price of about $1.5 million.

Back then, it was a slum suburb left to society's poorest, and a refuge for the huge number of migrants who had recently arrived from Europe in search of a better life.

About 350,000 Italians had come to Australia in the 1950s and 60s, a guaranteed market for Giuseppe and his two boys.

In between packing shelves in the evening and serving during the day, Mel and Sam would walk the streets at night dropping flyers — one side in Italian, the other in English — enticing the broader community to get adventurous with their cuisine.

"Aussies did not know about delis, they didn't know about salamis, cheeses or olives. Sun-dried tomatoes, they'd say, 'yuk, what's that?'," Sam says.

"They weren't interested," Mel says. "But now they are. Now they're asking for the ciabatta, the balsamic vinegar."

At Piedimonte's today, you can still see the patchwork of salami-like floor tiles, a hodgepodge of materials from the original business and later extensions, and a constant reminder for Sam and Mel of those early struggles, a time long before spag bol and pizza became a weekly family dinner staple.

This is a place where fixed-gear bikes meet leather shopping carts.

Where 19-year-old arts students wearing over-sized op shop cardis cross paths with nonnas wearing the real deal.

Some of them have been buying their milk and pasta dura here since the store opened.

It's a melting pot community hub, where the scent of cured meat meets freshly ground espresso beans drifting down the stairs.

At 75, Sam is still head honcho, business visionary.

"I love what I do. A lot of people say 'why do you still work?' Well what do you want me to do, get in a chair and rot? The love is still here."

While Mel's at peace working quietly to keep things running on the floor, greeting every passing customer while checking stock in his peripheral vision, Sam's domain is his office.

The wood-panel walls are covered with photos and memorabilia of the past.

But his desk is covered with ideas for what lies ahead.

He's been drawing inspiration from places like Milan to shape a plan to transform their vintage store into a modern restaurant-style continental supermarket. A try-as-you-buy bar. A speciality cellar. A cooking station.

These grand visions embrace the family's Mediterranean heritage. They just don't confine them to a migrant story frozen in time.

It's a controversial move that's shaken some among the store's cult following.

Firstly, they're developing a multi-storey apartment complex above the store and an underground carpark beneath it, which has angered many local residents.

But there are also mixed emotions about saying goodbye to the kitsch quirkiness that its loyal customers have come to love.

This end of an era was never going to be easy.

A warm fuzziness comes with passing by the coin-operated toy dispensers at the front door, or the yellow leather-studded cafe chairs that seem to go hand-in-hand with a cannoli and espresso.

But it's time to move on, Sam says.

The nostalgia the place evokes is the very thing holding them back.

"Unfortunately we've got people who don't want it to change," he says. "But I've been here since 1958. I've seen it all change."

"There is mixed emotions because everybody loves it the way it is," Joe Snr says.

Joe Snr and his cousin Joe Jnr, both their grandfather's namesake, are next in line to share the dynasty's throne.

"You're in a catch-22 because you want to move forward but your customer base — especially in the Fitzroy area — they don't want you to change. They want the 60s and 70s look still," Joe Snr says.

"We're sort of stuck in the old ways at the moment."

It may appear that the kitschy decor of Piedimonte's makes the place.

But behind the scenes there's something else that appears to set it apart from the big chains.

This family — who've slowly handed over their keys and passed on their trust — also encompasses many of their most loyal employees. Some have stuck around for more than 20 years.

The longest-serving staff member, Carmel, has been here for 48 years.

She started on the checkout when she was 15. Joe Snr learned the ropes at her register, she nudges.

"I did," he agrees.

Family is more important than the bricks and mortar, Sam says.

"If I didn't want it to stay a family business I'd turn around and sell it to Coles or Woolworths — they've been knocking on the doors.

In 60 years of operation, including expanding into other ventures, Sam says many other local businesses have succumbed to the pressures of big corporations.

"The offers have been pretty good but it's always been no," he says.

As he walks through their cafe turned newsagent and party supplies department, he puts his arm around a young woman.

"Third generation right here," he says.

It's his granddaughter, Cartia, the only one of her three sisters who's involved in the business so far. She works in the office a couple of days a week while she's studying.

"No pressure," he laughs.

Yeah, she feels a little bit of the pressure, she admits.

Without a revamp, Sam says, none of his grandchildren see their own future in the business.

As Joe Snr arrives with the fresh market flowers after a 1:00am start, he admits he didn't always see that future either.

"When I was younger and still at school and I'd see Dad and how hard he worked and the hours he used to put in, I'd look at him and say I don't want to be like him," he laughs.

"But unfortunately it's turned out that I am."

Joe Jnr, like his father Sam, will lead the ship. And he's well aware he's going to be guiding it through some trying times ahead. He knows they need to keeping moving and find their niche, or they'll be swallowed up as more multinationals target the Australian market.

"We're not doing it for greed," he says. "We're doing it because we need to survive.

"We want to set a business up for the next generation."

The family knows that keeping the community on board is key to survival. Their next challenge is finding a balance — staying true to their heritage while setting up a business that can endure whatever the future throws at it.

Can they strike that balance? Joe hopes so. His own morals rely on it.

"We don't want a store that wipes out the whole personal heritage that is sentimental to us," Joe Jnr says.

"I need to be sure that that stays so that my children will know where their great grandparents started from.

"I think it's important for people to think forward, but never forget where you started from, never forget how small you were."