VIP Service for Garden City Customers

Not every business owner can come to work after 30 years in the same field and consider it a gift. But that's how Richard Spoering views his position as owner of Town Meat Market, located at 156 Seventh Street in the heart of Garden City.

"It's the greatest thing," he said. "I've been given a gift to work with great people, a gift to work in a great community. It's the ultimate to have this."

Town Meats has been serving Garden City for more than 50 years. Spoering bought the business and took over on Oct. 1, 1994. He had previously owned a meat market in Richmond Hill. What separates Town Meats from many other butchers is the level of service it provides. Every customer who walks into the store is treated like a VIP.

"Whatever our customers want, we do it for them," Spoering said. "We have such a good rapport with them. There is a trust factor, a confidence level that builds up between the customer and the store tender."

Town Meats has 200-plus customers who are ARs (accounts receivables), people who are billed each month. There are many dozens of others who are cash customers. The remarkable thing is that Spoering knows the names and backgrounds of many of them.

"It's an innate thing," he said of recalling names. "I make it my business to know their names."

He said he tries to quickly learn people's tendencies, such as how they like to be addressed. He will call someone by their first name only if they have given their tacit approval; otherwise it is "Mrs. Jones" or "Mr. Smith." He also makes it his business to know what his customers want, right down to preparation, packaging and delivery method.

Despite the frenetic pace of business at Town Meats, there never seems to be an order that cannot be met. Whether it is great planning and preparation or simply taking care of unforeseen circumstances, Town Meats has earned a reputation for quality meats and service.

"You have to know your men and what they bring to the table. They all have different butcher skills and different interpersonal skills," Spoering said. "When I go on vacation – without a cell phone – things should run as smoothly without me as if I were here, otherwise I am not doing my job correctly."

For the last eight years, Town Meat Market has provided door-to-door service to its East End customers (mostly Garden City summer residents) every Friday in the summer. The orders are placed on Wednesdays. "We box it, ice it and prepare it whatever way the customer wants it," said Spoering, whose store prepares about a dozen orders a week. They charge $10 per customer.

Town Meats also does local deliveries to Garden City and surrounding communities. Beyond that, it has a database of about 30 North Shore customers, stretching from Douglaston to Oyster Bay Cove. Once a week Town Meats also delivers to those communities.

There are even former Garden City residents who remain customers, as far away as Georgia and Vermont. "There we send UPS next-day deliveries," Spoering said. 

Town Meats, which is open seven days a week, carries trimmed dry-aged prime beef, fresh poultry, American lamb, city pork, Bell & Evans chicken, lobsters, sauces, cheeses and other dry goods.