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| Ranch Market on 67th and Camelback (October 10, 2011 photo by Gaudy Silva) |
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| Ranch Market from the inside (October 10, 2011 photo by Gaudy Silva) |
This Market place is one of the few places Hispanics can shop to find items they know from back home. The first Ranch Market place was opened in the year 2002 here in Arizona; the founders of this market were Mike Provenzano Sr. and his four sons’. Mike Provenzano Sr. is the CEO of Ranch Market, at the age of 13 he worked for a little mom and pop store sorting bottles. He said when interviewed “I really enjoyed dealing with the people in a Hispanic area,” he also says “I knew then what I wanted to do in life.” Then he went to work in Los Angeles where he started to pursue his dreams about developing a market (Igo, Julio). The reason they wanted to create a Hispanic store was because they saw how the communities were changing, so they wanted to “give the customer the variety, brands, and fresh authentic foods they know and love in a warm, upscale environment.” This is how they also came up with the name for the store. Ranch Market was as huge success that it led to additional stores not just in Phoenix but also in El Paso, Texas and one in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Not only does Mike Provenzano and his sons own nine Ranch Markets, they also own” a gas station, two Laundromats, an 80,000 square foot corporate office warehouse in California, and a 13000 square foot warehouse in Phoenix (Welcome to Pros Ranch Markets).
The reason I chose Ranch Market place as one of the sites to research was because I’m Hispanic and have been to the Market before. Another reason is because I thought it would be nice to know the background of one of the famous stores provided for Hispanics. I found it ironic that a “white” family constructed a Hispanic store and is now very popular for Latinos to go grocery shopping. The irony is that the store is structured like a pueblo store, one that you would find in Mexico. It also has a Latino vibe in the store, because in the store they have Spanish music playing, most of their employees are Hispanic, the products one finds in the store are those that wouldn’t normally be in a market, and it’s decorated with a lot of pride towards their culture. So it’s hard to believe that a Caucasian family owns the market when in fact Ranch Market doesn’t have their culture in it.
However the state of Arizona announced in April 2010 that they wanted to pass a law called SB 1070 were it aimed at discouraging illegal immigrants from entering or remaining in the state (Arizona Immigration Law SB 1070). This law affects Ranch Markets business because most of their customers and employees were Hispanics, and this law was aimed more towards Hispanics because the majority of immigrants coming to Arizona were Latinos who came from South of the state. Although before SB 1070 event took effect Ranch Market fired around 300 of its 1,500 valley employees in April, after a federal Immigration (Laudig, Michele). ICE had found out that Ranch Market had 300 undocumented employees therefore Ranch Market had to fire all those who had false documentation. This started a controversy when Americans found out why it was hard to find jobs.
- Gaudy Silva
References
"Arizona Immigration Law (SB 1070) - The New York Times." Times Topics - The New York Times. The New York Times, 11 Apr. 2011. Web. 28 Nov. 2011.
Welcome to PROS RANCH MARKETS. Web. 28 Nov. 2011.
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