September 14, 2018
StreetView/Google Street View
The old Fiorella's Sausage shop and its antique cash register had been in Italian Market, at 817 Christian St., for more than 100 years. The store closed in January 2018, and property's new owner, restauranteur Marc Vetri, said Friday that the antique cash register has been stolen from the building.
Fiorella’s Sausage is an Italian Market staple. Luigi Fiorella left Italy and began working as a butcher in Philadelphia in 1892, he purchased a three-story structure at 817 Christian St. in 1904, and his family has lived in and sold sausages from the building ever since.
But in January, Fiorella’s closed after the New Year and said in a Facebook post it would be closed until further notice for a family matter.
On Friday, Philadelphia’s Scott Schroeder, who runs the popular Philly food Instagram @foodsyoucaneat, spotted a “For Sale” sign in the Fiorella’s front window:
View this post on InstagramI literally wept and softly cried out no
A post shared by Scott Schroeder (@foodsyoucaneat) on
The Re/Max listing says the price is $775,000 for the building, all three floors included: the sausage store and the two-bedroom apartment above where the Fiorella family lived for generations.
The restaurant itself includes a treasure trove of unique features. To name a few from the listing:
• Under the counter refrigeration
• A unique in-floor scale
• A working dumbwaiter elevator
• A "huge" in-wall safe
Phone calls to Re/Max agent Kevin O’Connor for more information were not immediately answered, so it’s unclear whether a buyer interested in continuing to use store as a butcher shop could use the Fiorella Sausages name. The listing says the property could be opened "tomorrow."
As of 2016, Dan Fiorella, who started working at the store in September of 1966, was in charge of running the butcher side of the store, and his wife, Trish, managed the sales side.
The store still used a 19th-century cash register purchased by the Fiorella family in 1901, and the original recipe for its liver sausage.
Follow Adam & PhillyVoice on Twitter: @@adamwhermann | @thePhillyVoice
Like us on Facebook: PhillyVoice
Add Adam's RSS feed to your feed reader
Have a news tip? Let us know.
