Roxburgh Fresh Choice supermarket changes hands today after business partners and brothers-in-law Ian Cahill and Chris Toms move on.
Mr Cahill is married to Mr Toms’ sister Ange, who pursued her own career in early childhood education.
Mr Toms’ late wife Cath, who died unexpectedly a year ago, was also part of the supermarket business.
Formerly a butcher in the town, Mr Cahill mentioned to the then-owner of the shop Dave Burton he was interested in buying it.
Mr Toms, who also runs an orchard, said he would ask every time he delivered fruit if the Burtons would sell him the shop today.
“One day I asked Barbara [Burton] and she said ‘yes, we will’. I had to go home and tell Cath I’d bought the shop.”
Mrs Toms told her husband she had thought she was going to be a stay-at-home mum but found herself working daily alongside Mr Cahill running the supermarket.
Mr Cahill said having long-serving, capable staff had been a huge asset to the business, especially after Mrs Toms’ death.
Pam Crawford had been training to run the store beforehand and was able to step up, Mr Cahill said.
Mrs Crawford had been working in the shop for 26 years while Sue Holland had been there 20 years and Averil Pay even longer.
Mrs Pay had brought baking in for the staff every second Tuesday without fail, Mr Cahill said.
An ever-increasing range of items for sale and growing numbers of seasonal workers, including many from Vanuatu, had been some of the biggest changes in their time in the business, he said.
“When we started we had 4500 lines in-store, now we have 8500.”
Specialty items such as gluten-free foods had expanded hugely.
The cost of compliance had “gone through the roof” over the years.
A butcher by trade, Mr Cahill had kept a butcher on the staff and many people travelling to Wānaka and Queenstown stopped to pick up their groceries on the way through, he said.
“They can be in and out in 20 minutes and they always say how good our meat is.”
New owners Nick and Ashley Rutherford, and their two young children, were moving from the North Island to take over the business.
Mr Toms laughed when asked what he was going to do next.
“I’m going to retire and run an orchard.”
However, he had another task to do next year.
“Cath had a bucket list and it was mostly going to visit people who had worked for us so I’m going to do it for her.”
The list will take him to the UK and Europe after visiting their daughter in Melbourne.
Mr Cahill said he would not miss the 5.30am alarms or the others that could go off any time 24/7 for security, freezers and other shop-related reasons.
He planned to play more golf and take a caravan holiday around New Zealand.
But first he had some chores to complete closer to home.
“I have a list of things to be done around the house that is 13 years long.”
julie.asher@alliedmedia.co.nz
