What’s not to love about Pompano’s $.99 Farmer’s Market? Its location

Pompano Beach’s Peter Piper of produce was a fruit and vegetable wholesaler for 20 years in South Florida before he decided to open his first retail store in early 2023.

After finding a location, Doug Habe put up a large yellow banner advertising “$.99 Farmer’s Market.”

He began promoting the store on Facebook. He had to. Though easily accessible off Sample Road, just east of the Festival Flea Market, the store at 3480 NW 27th Ave. is not visible to passing traffic.

Through social media and word of mouth, word spread fast from shoppers happy about being able to load their carts while paying considerably less than what traditional supermarkets charge.

Seen recently: two-for-99-cent mangos, tomatoes for 99 cents a pound, a pound of asparagus for 99 cents, five limes for 99 cents, large naval oranges for 99 cents each, two jars of Korean barbecue sauce for 99 cents — and yes, pickled peppers. Two jars for 99 cents.

“I opened up doing 1,500 customers a day because of Facebook and because you don’t see 99-cent farmer’s markets,” Habe said in a recent interview. “What I’m doing now is impossible. Only I can do it. Because I have the hustle in me.”

The store’s Facebook page has racked up 3,600 followers and 2,500 likes.

On TikTok and YouTube, dozens of customers have posted videos extolling the store’s low prices. They’ve racked up thousands of views.

But in recent months, the phenomenon has died down, Habe says. Traffic, while still steady, has slowed. And now the store is preparing to move.

Habe, 54, says his prices keep his margins too low to allow him to thrive at its present location.

But to raise prices would defeat the purpose of opening a store that helps families stretch their dollars as food costs soar at the best-known supermarket chains.

“This store is going to do really good,” he said. “And I’ve got to hold on. That’s the problem. It’s so hard to hold on. If I knew it wasn’t going to go good, I would just close it. But I know the people need it. Especially with prices of produce right now. Are you kidding me? They need this.”

A few weeks ago, he asked his Facebook followers to suggest new locations. About 20 to 30 fans piped in with suggestions, and one of them — a former Save-A-Lot location at the southwest corner of Atlantic Boulevard and Powerline Road in Pompano Beach — will be the store’s new home, he said.

He hopes to have it open by April 15. A real estate agent handling the property confirmed on Friday that Habe was scheduled to close on a lease on Monday.

A decision to close, then reopen

Habe was planning to close the store, then known as Doug Specialties, for good in January, he said.

Two vendors had recently filed federal lawsuits against him and his company, claiming he had not paid for produce they supplied him last year.

Those lawsuits, filed in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale, have since been settled.

Habe says he recently had to sell one of the store’s two commercial coolers for $200,000 to pay his vendors. He had bought it for $580,000, he said.

On Jan. 25, he posted on the store’s Facebook page that “today will be our last day opened and we will be 50% off the whole day.”

Fans expressed their gratitude and wished him well. One said she was in the store two days ago “and multiple employees said you were NOT shutting down.”

The next day, a Friday, he posted that “Doug Specialties is back in business!!!!” and would reopen the following Thursday. He implored, “Please come support Doug Specialties’ last chance.”

The message, a day after Habe announced that the store was closing, puzzled some Facebook followers. Some posted various theories. Most expressed relief and gratitude. One said she prayed for the store to find a way to stay open.

He posted on Facebook that “a good friend” is helping him keep the doors open. “Do I owe money out? Yes, tons of it,” he wrote. “I lost everything opening this store but who doesn’t owe money when they open a new business? I had a dream and took a chance.”

In the interview, Habe said, “I really did close. I was going to be out of business. And why I didn’t close was because I looked at Facebook, all the people: ‘Please don’t close. We need you. We love you. Let’s do a Go Fund Me.’

“I was like, ‘Oh my God, these people are all doing this for me?’ So I said, ‘You know what? Just tell the people that I wanted to remodel and we’ll open it back up.'”

How can he sell so cheap?

He shared some secrets that explain why he can sell so many items for 99 cents:

He still works as a wholesaler — buying from local farms and suppliers from countries like Peru and Brazil — and will stock the store with a few leftover pallets after selling most of what comes in on tractor trailers to stores like Presidente and Bravo, he said.

“Because it’s already profit, it’s free. And I’ll just throw it in the store and sell it for any price I want,” he said.

He’s willing to lose money on staples like tomatoes to get people in the store to buy other items.

“A box of tomatoes — right now, I’m paying $35 for it,” he said. “I’m selling for 99 cents a pound. I lose $10 a box to sell for that price. But my other items I pay way cheaper for, so it’s averaging off,” he said.

Many of those other items “are not Grade A,” he said. “It’s not the best you can buy. Like if you went to a fancy Joseph’s (Classic Market in Boca Raton) or a Publix — their produce is perfect, right? Not even a mark on it. And if they see one little problem with it, they’ll tell the company, ‘Oh, we don’t want it.'”

When those stores reject imperfect shipments, suppliers that he has cultivated over 20 years in the wholesale business call him.

He knows there’s nothing wrong with produce that has a few imperfections.

“I take rejected loads at a much cheaper price and put them in here,” he says.

But he can’t count on finding irregular supplies of everything all the time. “Half of my store is at the regular price. Whatever the market is, that’s what I pay.”

That’s why shoppers might find pineapples for 99 cents one week and $2.99 the next.

Habe says he still donates at least two tractor-trailer loads of produce every week to area food banks.

Sometimes he will announce that he’s giving away bananas or tomatoes for the entire day at the store. All you can carry away.

Frequent shoppers respond to his dedication to helping local residents make ends meet.

Fans and workers hope for success

“I have nothing but nice things to say about Doug and his store,” Tamarac resident Kelly Ann Moore said. “(It’s) a very much needed ray of sunshine in this dark storm of high-priced foods. He truly is a wonderful asset to this community.”

Habe employs 10 workers: five cashiers and five stock workers. There’s also Rebecca Napoli, who takes care of paperwork, and George Styles, a fellow New Yorker who got his start, like Habe, unloading freight at New York City’s distribution hub for produce, Hunt’s Point Produce Market in the Bronx.

Styles, who has known Habe in South Florida for 14 years, laid out the store’s shelves and adds family-friendly design touches like the Easter baskets with stuffed bunnies and Disney characters that adorn the walls and tops of display racks.

He can be seen in Facebook videos promoting the store.

Styles says he get a kick out of interacting with children who come in with their mothers. “I do it for the women and children,” he said, “to see the smiles on the kids’ faces when you give them a honeycrisp apple.”

Napoli says the store, recently renamed The Produce Spot, is bringing in just enough revenue to justify continuing. The staff is counting on the new location bringing in the store’s regular customers and an entirely new crowd that will put it firmly in the black, she says.

“With payroll and what we spend on inventory, we’re just making enough to survive,” she said. “We’re hoping for twice as many customers in the new place.”

Ron Hurtibise covers business and consumer issues for the South Florida Sun Sentinel. He can be reached by phone at 954-356-4071, on Twitter @ronhurtibise or by email at rhurtibise@sunsentinel.com.