Business of Excellence Awards: Schinkel’s Gourmet Meats named medium business of year

What was supposed to be a short-term job for John Schinkel turned into nearly four decades of running a highly successful business satisfying the taste buds of area customers.

Schinkel, owner of Schinkel’s Gourmet Meats in Chatham, said he’d only planned to work for a year at an Essex meat market his father, Herman, opened in 1962 with his uncle.

“When I was done school, I said, ‘I’m never going to cut meat for a living,’” he laughed.

But after a while, Schinkel found he liked the meat business and realized, “I could be good at this.”

This proved correct when he made the jump to the grocery industry. Schinkel moved up the ranks, garnering an attractive offer to manage a meat department that could have led to managing the entire store.

“But, the opportunity to run your own business, that was enticing to me,” he said.

In 1984, his father asked him to open a shop together, and “the rest is history,” Schinkel said.

His father retired in 2000 and he’s carried on the business since.

Schinkel’s Gourmet Meats was honored as medium-sized business of the year at the Chatham-Kent Chamber of Commerce’s 135^th annual Business of Excellence Awards ceremony April 13.

Starting a meat business in 1984 in Chatham had its challenges, especially amid an economic downturn.

Schinkel said they started slow and steadily gained business over the years by honing their role in Chatham-Kent. They found their niche in the 1990s, he said, deciding, “We have to do something that’s better quality, give customers a reason to come to the store.”

The business has been built on quality and service, Schinkel said.

“First of all, we do offer a quality product,” he said. “I go out and buy the best.”

And his staff, many of them long-term employees, provide great customer service.

“We try to choose our staff so they complement what we do,” Schinkel said, noting some bosses seek out specific employees to ask for the same cut of meat they got the week before.

Changing with the times also has been a big part of their success, he said. “Things evolve and shopping habits change.”

Where once there was strong consumer demand for lean meat, for example, people now want more fat and marbling in their steak for flavor, he said.

The shop has been into value-added products for the last 20 years, Schinkel said, offering things such as prepared stuffed chicken breasts, kabobs and London broils. Value-added products have really grown in the industry over the last decade, he said.

This recognition from the chamber is “super cool,” Schinkel said. “I was pretty stoked when I found out.”

Even being nominated was an honour, he added, citing all the great businesses in the community.

“To win this, shows me we’ve been here for 39 years, we’ve done a good job and we haven’t got stagnant, and we’re still appreciated in the community,” Schinkel said.