Workers put the finishing touches on the new Cermak Fresh Market that will open Wednesday at 1541 Miller Park Way. The chain, based in the Chicago area, is trying to grab a share of the Milwaukee grocery market by offering a wide selection of meat and ethnic foods to go along with fresh produce delivered seven days a week. Credit: Michael Sears

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With new Walmart supermarkets being developed throughout the Milwaukee area, Target expanding its grocery aisles, Pick 'n Save remodeling stores, Woodman's Food Markets building its third area megastore and Sendik's Food Markets pursuing additional opportunities, you might not think southeastern Wisconsin needs another supermarket chain.

Unless you're Mike Bousis, whose family operates Cermak Fresh Markets in the Chicago area. Bousis is opening the first Wisconsin Cermak supermarket Wednesday in West Milwaukee, and he has a quick response when asked how the small chain will compete with the likes of Walmart, Target and Pick 'n Save.

"I think they're going to have to compete with me," Bousis said. "That store will speak for itself when the customer walks in. I guarantee you that it's a store that no one has ever seen. It's a beautiful store."

The new Cermak Fresh Market is at 1541 Miller Park Way, adjacent to a Target store which includes a grocery department that expanded just over a year ago. Cermak will emphasize its fresh produce section as well as selling food that appeals to shoppers from a variety of ethnic heritages, including Mexican, Polish, German, Italian, Greek and Indian, Bousis said.

The 60,000-square-foot store's features include homemade tortillas, a full-service bakery, a large meat department, and a deli with a seating area. It amounts to a $15 million investment, including the building, its fixtures and other expenses, Bousis said.

Humboldt beginnings

The Bousis family's first store opened in 1978 in Chicago's Humboldt Park neighborhood, catering to that area's Puerto Rican community. In 1991, a second Cermak store opened in a Mexican neighborhood in Cicero, Ill., just west of Chicago.

Since then, seven additional stores have opened throughout the Chicago area. Different family members own the stores, with Bousis operating the Aurora, Ill., and West Milwaukee supermarkets.

"Basically, we started out as a Hispanic grocer," Bousis said. "As the stores got bigger and bigger and evolved, we've become an international market. . . . If you were to walk into the (West Milwaukee) store, whether you're Hispanic, whether you're German, whether you're Polish, whether you're Italian, you'd think that store was for you."

The Cermak focus on fresh fruit and vegetables comes from the first Chicago store, which was a fruit market. The West Milwaukee store features a produce section that Bousis says is around five times the size of the produce section at a nearby Pick 'n Save on Miller Park Way.

Bousis said he buys fruits and vegetables at the Chicago wholesale produce market every morning, seven days a week, to make sure they're delivered fresh daily to his stores.

"It's something that the chain stores and the big retailers can't do," Bousis said. "When you have a thousand stores, you're not paying attention to a single store."

The Cermak stores also hire enough people to make sure there are plenty of workers on the floor, and that all departments remain active when the stores are open, from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily, Bousis said.

"We don't shut down departments to cut back on payroll," said Bousis. He said the West Milwaukee store will have 130 employees - about 80% of them full-time.

Ethnic appeal

Cermak ought to do well in Milwaukee, said David Livingston, a Pewaukee supermarket site selection consultant.

"They're going to cater to a big ethnic crowd," Livingston said.

Opening on Miller Park Way is a big advantage, he said, giving Cermak a safe, accessible location that will help draw shoppers from throughout the Milwaukee area looking for ethnic foods.

Livingston said being next to Target could create a scenario where some shoppers buy conventional items such as cereal, peanut butter and snacks at Target, and then buy produce, fresh meat and specialty items at Cermak. He said a store like Cermak will often draw over 35% of its sales from produce, compared to a typical supermarket that draws 10% of its sales from fruits and vegetables.

Along with pulling customers from the Milwaukee area's larger chains, Cermak will likely appeal to those who now shop at El Rey, which operates four food stores on the south side that target mainly Latinos, Livingston said.

El Rey, which also operates a south side facility that makes tortillas, tortilla chips and tamales, will continue making direct purchases from food vendors to keep its costs low, and will buy the freshest items possible, said Olivia Villarreal, El Rey co-owner and administrator.

"Our plan of action is to stick to what we know best," she said.

Villarreal said Cermak has approached El Rey employees at their workplaces and offered them jobs, a tactic she characterized as "stealing" trained workers.

"We've never stooped that low," Villarreal said. She said a small number of El Rey workers have quit to work for Cermak.

Bousis said Cermak hasn't approached El Rey employees to offer them jobs. However, Cermak did stage a job fair that attracted workers from El Rey and elsewhere, he said.

"If (El Rey workers) were happy, they wouldn't come here looking for jobs," Bousis said.

Development accelerates

Meanwhile, Cermak Fresh Market becomes the latest in a series of new commercial developments on or near Miller Park Way.

In the past year, new retail on the street includes an Auto Zone store and a GFS Marketplace supermarket, which is known for selling food in large quantities.

Also, construction has started on a combined Walmart supermarket and discount store on W. Greenfield Ave., about a block east of Miller Park Way. That 148,000-square-foot store will open next spring.

Cermak will have an estimated assessed value of $5 million, according to West Milwaukee officials. The village provided $400,000 to help finance the store, with that money being repaid through property taxes generated by the supermarket and other developments within a tax incremental financing district along Miller Park Way.

Bousis said he hopes to open more stores in the Milwaukee area. He'll be looking to see where the West Milwaukee store's customers live.

"We'll see how it goes," Bousis said. "The neighborhoods are going to dictate where we go, depending on where we're drawing from."