02 – Tom’s Supermarket

166 Banna Avenue, Griffith

In the mid-1950s Tom Apolloni, one of Griffith’s most enterprising citizens, decided to transform his Italian grocery shop and milk bar into a supermarket after reading about this new American retail concept in a magazine. When it opened in 1958 supermarkets were still rare in Australia. Being all about convenience, Tom’s Supermarket operated outside the legal trading hours, opening in the evenings and on Sundays. It closed in 1982, unable to compete with the larger supermarkets.