Forty Years of Top Quality Service and Gourmet Foods at The Chop Shop

Like the fine wines and premium cuts of beef it sells, has aged well. The west Bradenton butcher and gourmet delicatessen opened in 1971, and has since solidified its reputation in the community for being the best location to purchase quality meats and difficult-to-find grocery products.

Family owned and operated for the past forty years, the Chop Shop is known for its homespun style of customer service and inherent sense of comfortable, small-town charm that is lacking in most large chain grocers today.

Doug Stivers began his grocery career when he opened a general store in Kentucky in the 1960s after serving in the military and the New York Police Department. When his brother, who had spent his entire life in the meat business, opened The Chop Shop in Bradenton in 1971, Stivers relocated his family to Florida to partner in the business.

Although the elder Stivers is still involved in the business, the everyday operations have since been handed down to his children. Brothers Mike and Steve Stivers, along with their sister, Susan Ambrose, currently operate the store that they grew up in.

“This is very much a family business,” said Ambrose. “We can all agree that we wouldn’t be nearly as close as we are had we not worked together.”

Ambrose and her brothers have been working in the store since the mid-1980s and can attest to the loyalty of their customer base.

“It’s crazy – the whole generational thing,” Ambrose said. “My daughter is 9 years old now and we have customers who have known her for her entire life. There are people that I remember shopping here 20 years ago with their kids. Now their kids are coming and shop for their own families.”

As for her own daughter, Ambrose chuckled as she said “She says she wants to work here, and then in the next breath she wants to be a teacher. Or a scientist. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

While it may not be as large as chain stores like Publix or Sweetbay, The Chop Shop boasts a number of features that keep customers coming back.

“Our one-on-one approach to quality customer service is the biggest thing,” said Mike Stivers. “But there are a lot of things about us that set us apart.”

One unique aspect of The Chop Shop is that every Friday and Saturday, Steve Stivers can be spotted grilling chicken, barbeque pork, and the award-winning ribs that the shop is known for in the store’s parking lot alongside Manatee Avenue. Along with the favorite grilling staples, Stivers also prepares rotating weekly dishes, including smoked mullet and juicy turkey drums, assuring that there’s something delicious on the menu every weekend.  

The Chop Shop also prides itself in offering a selection that cannot be found elsewhere.

“I go to food shows once or twice per year,” Ambrose said. “If a vendor tells me that they sell to one of the big chain stores, I’m less interested because I’m not trying to compete with Publix. I prefer to seek out items that aren’t widely available. The more I can get a hold of that no one else carries, the happier I am.”

Taylor McDonald, a first time customer at The Chop Shop, said that she was delighted to see meats and cheeses in the deli case that she had not come across since her childhood in Germany.

“It’s exciting to come into a store like this and stumble upon all these foods you can hardly find anywhere else,” said McDonald.

Although The Chop Shop imports a great deal of its products from overseas, it also remains true to its family-oriented nature by buying products locally.

“We really value the local community, so we try to buy locally as much as possible,” Mike Stivers explained.

The Chop Shop purchases its eggs from Sutters Egg Farm in Sarasota and its milk from Dakin Dairy Farm in Myakka.

Not only does the store shop locally for its products, it also provides to a number of popular local restaurants in Bradenton and Sarasota. The Shake Pit in Bradenton, Skinny’s Place in Holmes Beach, Sam Snead’s Tavern and Tasty Home Cookin’ in Sarasota all look to The Chop Shop for their meat needs.

The meat is one of the biggest details that sets The Chop Shop apart from supermarket chains. The majority of meat that the store carries is from Nebraska or Iowa, and is guaranteed to be of the highest quality available. The seafood department at The Chop Shop also prides itself on carrying the best product available from salmon to cod, sole, sushi grade tuna, crawfish, and wild caught Louisiana shrimp.

The Chop Shopwill even dry age beef for customers who place special orders.

Although beef connoisseurs sing the praises of the enhanced taste that it creates, the practice of dry aging beef is rarely practiced by supermarkets because it contributes to significant weight loss of the meat. As the meat has to be hung and stored at near-freezing temperatures for up to several weeks, it is a lengthy and expensive process that is all but obsolete outside of upscale steakhouses and butcher shops.

Dry aging is not the only rare request that The Chop Shop receives. The store also gets a number of requests for unusual foods ranging from beef tongue to Rocky Mountain Oysters (bull testicles), goat heads, and even rattlesnake.

“The strangest request I’ve ever had is for lion leg,” Stivers said. “It used to actually be legal.”

However, the strange requests have diminished somewhat over the years, according to Ambrose.

“The practice of eating beef tongue, for instance, is a dying breed,” Ambrose said. “Older generations were eating tongue and brains because it was cheap, not necessarily because it tasted fabulous. Back then, people used every single part of the animal. You see less of that today.”

Stivers and Ambrose agreed that there has been a shift in consumer requests and overall consciousness over the past several years.

“Throughout the past few years, requests have been more along the lines of what’s healthy or ethical,” Stivers said. “Today, people are asking for organic, gluten free, free range, cage free, grass fed, antibiotic free products – that kind of thing.”

“We carry most of it and I’ve tried it all. I have to say, though – if you want something to taste good, there’s nothing better than grain fed beef.”

When it comes to quality meats and seafood, dairy, produce, international and gourmet food items, The Chop Shop is a must-visit for local foodies.

However, if you come on a weekend, make sure you have a strong resolve. Otherwise, with the tantalizing smells that fill the parking lot when Steve Stivers is at the grill, you may not make it to the front door.