Smart & Final marks 150th anniversary

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Smart & Final

In 1871, Herman Hellman, Jacob Haas and Bernard Cohn opened Hellman-Haas Grocery Co., a Los Angeles-based grocery company selling daily necessities including flour, brown sugar, salt, patent medicines, rope, sheepherding supplies, chewing tobacco and gunpowder.

Smart & Final

Smart & Final Wholesale Grocers got its start in 1914, two years after being founded by J.S. Smart, a banker from Saginaw, Mich., as the Santa Ana Wholesale Grocery Co.

Smart & Final

An ownership change in 1889 turned the Hellman-Haas Grocery Co. into Haas, Baruch & Co.

Smart & Final

Smart & Final Wholesale Grocers relocated to San Pedro, Calif., after changing its name from the Santa Ana Wholesale Grocery Co.

Smart & Final

A Smart & Final Wholesale Grocers truck from the 1930s.

Smart & Final

In 1923, Smart & Final opened a store in Long Beach, Calif., and became the first grocer west of Chicago to offer the “cash and carry” concept.

Smart & Final

Haas, Baruch & Co. launched what was perhaps the first private-label brand, Iris — still carried today at Smart & Final.

Smart & Final

Before the cash-and-carry concept took root, grocery stores required a clerk to collect goods for customers.

Smart & Final

Smart & Final Wholesale Grocers and Haas, Baruch & Co. eventually merged under the Smart & Final name in 1953.

Smart & Final

A Smart & Final Wholesale Grocers truck circa 1928.

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