Owner and operator of the Burnt Fork Market in Stevensville, Jimmy Edwards, is not an office type of guy. He’s got one, back in the warehouse section of the sprawling grocery store, but it doesn’t get much use. If you want to talk to the boss when you visit the business, you will usually have to find him somewhere out on the floor. He could be checking on the status of the produce section, which he is quite proud of, or he could be down some aisle stacking shelves. That’s where I found him for this interview about the recent award. Burnt Fork Market was selected as the Business of the Year by the Bitterroot Valley Chamber of Commerce. He was presented with the award at this year’s annual Chamber banquet.
“It’s nice to be recognized,” said Edwards about the award. “We’ve been doing this a long time.”
In fact, his family started in the grocery business up at the Three Mile Trading Post northeast of Stevensville in 1946. Then they moved to downtown Stevensville, just south of where Valley Drug is located, and ran the grocery in that location until 1978. That’s when the current building was constructed, and the grocery moved to the south edge of town. His dad operated the business there until sometime around 2007 when he sold the business to the store’s manager. That business didn’t last very long and the building ended up sitting idle for about five years.
The family remained involved in the grocery business in Missoula, but at one point Jimmy came to Stevensville to try and sell the building for his dad. But he said after talking to a lot of people what he found was that a lot of them really wanted it to be a grocery store again.
“I came down to sell, but I ended up looking into the possibility of just opening it again,” said Edwards. He had a professional marketing analysis done and the answer, based on population statistics, was that it could be done, but it wouldn’t be easy.
“We decided to keep the building and opened up the store again in December of 2014,” he said.
The way to make it in a competitive arena, according to Edwards, is to be competitive. He said you can compare his prices to other grocery stores, and you will see that he may not have the same number of below cost sucker items, but he has consistently better prices on most things. Especially the things that count, like meat and produce. But the store also offers a healthy (pun intended) selection of natural and organic items.
Edwards said that the store in Missoula is very much a specialty item business, but the Bitterroot market is different.
“They still buy soda pop here,” said Edwards. He said he remembered back when you never saw a grocery store ad without some very special deal on soda pop. “Now, at the Missoula store I can’t even give away soda pop,” he said, “but people still buy soda pop here.”
Some specialty items have really taken hold here in the Bitterroot, though. Like the micro-brew selections. Edwards believes it was the introduction of his wine and specialty brew inventory that set a new bar (pun intended) for other grocery stores in the Bitterroot.
The business remains a family business and his son Brandon works full time in the Missoula store. His daughter Jessica, who is a student at the university, also works a couple of days a week at the store.
Edwards, who now lives in Stevensville again, said he loves the slower pace in the Bitterroot. He also loves the town and the community. He said his business has always tried to be involved with the community affairs and participate in the celebrations like Creamery Picnic and the Scarecrow Festival. He said his employees are very good about getting in the spirit of things in town.
“And then, to get recognized for it, it re-energizes you,” he said.