LOUISVILLE, KY. (WDRB NEWS) -- He has been a one man operation bringing farm fresh products to residents in Old Louisville. Now Ron Smith is about ready to open his second location.
"I am passionate about food and I like people so it all really works out well," says Smith at the site of his second location.
It has worked out well for Smith. For more than a year he has owned and operated The Root Cellar. It is a small fresh produce store in what was once an abandoned gas station in Old Louisville.
Smith stocks his store with fresh products grown within a 150-mile radius of Louisville. For example, he buys some of his lettuce from Grateful Greens, a greenhouse operation in Clarksville.
So far Smith's business has done well. So this weekend, he is opening his second store in part of an old mill in Germantown on the corner of Kentucky and Swan Streets. "I did some research," explains Smith, "and hopefully it will turn out for the best and the people in Germantown will come and shop and enjoy all of the good food."
Smith acknowledges the expansion into a second store is a lot to take on. But he says he gets a lot of satisfaction out of running a business where local people can buy locally grown products.
"They wanted a farmers market," he says, "and it is getting more difficult to open a farmers market; so we are the closest thing to a farmers market that you can get."
One that will soon be open six days a week starting at noon on Saturday.
"We are a full fledged retail store, we just have 100 percent local foods," he says.
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