Joanna Killan and Cory Dugas. Image: submitted.
A 126-year-old business in the Saint John City Market is beginning a new chapter with new owners.
Joanna Killen and Corey Dugas have taken ownership of Slocum & Ferris from long-time owners David Forestell and Sherrie Boyd.
The opportunity to buy the iconic city market business came when Dugas called Forrestell to inquire about when Slocum & Ferris would open again. The popular food stall has been closed since the arrival of COVID-19 in New Brunswick and Dugas was missing his regular steak sub.
“My favourite item to buy in the market was always the Slocum steak sub,” said Dugas in an interview with Huddle. “I like other places, but I’ve been missing it since March.”
“He called and said, ‘Dave, I miss my steak sub, what’s going on?’” added Killen.
“And [Dave] was like ‘well, you know, do you guys want to buy the business?’”
They met Forestell and Boyd the next afternoon and began the process.
Killen and Dugas are no strangers to entrepreneurship. For the past several years they ran Momentum Canada, a business development company that worked with companies in Canada and the U.S. But with COVID-19 bringing that business to a halt, they saw an opportunity to use their skills more locally.
“We love entrepreneurship so much and we want to be in the mix and then it dawned on us [to do] something hyper-local like Slocum but using the skills we have to create another side to the business,” said Killen.
“[It’s] going to a be a lot of working with the exporting of dulse and things like that, where we can take those skills we learned with Momentum and apply it into something that we love already and is a 126-year-old legacy that could grow even bigger than it is now.”
Besides moving Slocum & Ferris more online, Killen and Dugas plan to add some new offerings. Though 80 percent of the menu will remain the same, they plan to add some new items that pay homage to old popular Saint John restaurants.
“We’re just really going to enhance the brand around how Saint John it is. We’re going to be bringing out some new recipes that are throwbacks to restaurants that used to be here,” said Killen. “We’ll have a Reggies Burger and Barton’s hot dog, and we’re going to be making these Exhibition curly potatoes. We just really want to call out some of those favourite Saint John things.”
Slocum & Ferris will also launch a bakery and a line of take-home meals.
“We want to make it easier for people to take Slocum’s home and just keep a lot of the same staples but make it easier to get,” said Killen.
Pre-pandemic, the Saint John City Market was a popular place for office workers, cruise ship tourists and high school students. Though the pandemic has reduced a lot of regular foot traffic for the market, Killen and Dugas are confident in Slocum & Ferris’ future.
“We’re excited about taking it on at this time because based on what we’re looking at with numbers, we think we can make it work,” said Dugas. “Once cruise ships and things get back to whatever normal will look like, we feel that will just be a bonus.”
Killen said online retail and take-home options will also help the business weather COVID-19 challenges.
“Our business plan was built around that we could have nobody in the restaurant, so we’re really excited to release these different components of the business to make it easier to get different types of Slocum things,” she said
“[It could be] a gift of dulse or maple syrup, or it’s your favorite lunch item, or we’re doing this ‘Slocums at Home’ thing where you can actually bring home components and finish the meal at your place as something that you love from us. We’re trying to think of many ideas to make Slocum’s as accessible as possible.”
The plan is to launch the new Slocum & Ferris bakery in February, with the kitchen opening sometime in March, after the city does some renovations.
“We really think the market can be revitalized as something that’s a night destination, a day destination, something that’s the heart of Saint John,” said Dugas.
Cherise Letson is the associate editor of Huddle, an Acadia Broadcasting content partner.
