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Neukom's ready to end an 80-year tradition
By CHASE SQUIRES © St. Petersburg Times, published March 8, 2001 ZEPHYRHILLS -- For 80 years, the Neukom family has sold wares, remedies, sundries, sodas and snacks on the same downtown block. Next month, that will end. With 50-percent-off signs throughout the store and shelves emptying of goods without new stock to refill them, George Neukom said he will close his landmark family-owned store in April -- a victim, he said, of corporate American and government regulations. Neukom, 63, recalled a lifetime in business Wednesday but said he wasn't sad about the end of a venture. Rather, he said, he was looking ahead to other opportunities. "I'm not opposed to progress. That's just the way life is," he said. "A business like this is a dinosaur. You just don't see them any more." The downtown general store has been replaced, he said, by Wal-Mart and chain drug stores and convenience store giants that buy in bulk and have entire departments to cope with government regulations. The little guy, he said, has been forced out. Neukom's grandmother, Lorena Mae "Nukie" Neukom, founded the store in downtown Zephyrhills in 1921, across the street from the current Fifth Avenue location, Neukom said. "I grew up behind the counter," he said. The store expanded and moved up the street, then expanded again and moved across the street, with the family becoming established business people. Along the way, Neukom's became a meeting place for residents, Neukom said. Locals have gathered at the soda fountain to chat about politics and kid each other about events of the day since the start. A friendly breakfast game evolved in the 1930s, first with members of an unofficial club flipping a coin to see who would pay for the coffee, and later with a card full of numbers. In the "Scratch Game," regulars scratched off numbers on the card until only one number was left, and the corresponding member paid for the coffee. "We had a lot of fun with that," he said. "You always give the guy some grief about it, too." Neukom still has the original nickel used when the game started. It's in a frame at home. The end of Neukom's won't spell the end of the store's restaurant, Barb's Family Dining, "Where the Elite Meet to Eat," which is run independently by Barb Hoffman, Neukom said. The restaurant is planning to relocate. But for the first time, the restaurant where the Scratch Game found a home won't be inside Neukom's. Neukom said he will focus his energy on helping his son, George Neukom III, set up Neukom Groves, a fruit packing and shipping business in town. The family owns orange groves around the city, and the younger Neukom has already done well marketing fresh fruit and fresh-squeezed juice, his father said. "I probably should have closed up five, 10 years ago," Neukom said. "I just couldn't. A lot of people come by here. A lot of people depended on us."
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