From fresh-baked doughnuts and pies to crisp salads and salty pretzels, Middlefield’s new Amish Country Market, at 15711 West High Street, serves up just about everything but the kitchen sink.
From fresh-baked doughnuts and pies to crisp salads and salty pretzels, Middlefield’s new Amish Country Market, at 15711 West High Street, serves up just about everything but the kitchen sink.
Though he has greatly expanded in products over time, owner Danny Kuhns’ foray into food began with pretzels.
“Five years ago, I bought a pretzel shop down in Boardman, Ohio, at the Amish Market,” he recalled. “We doubled our business in about the first four months.”
After selling pretzels at The Pretzel Bar in Boardman for three years, Kuhns expanded to a low-rent trailer in Middlefield, which operated in similar fashion to a food truck.
“We moved around a little bit. It didn’t really work out very good,” he said, adding he decided to shut down the food truck and move into a storefront location, where the business doubled almost overnight.
After a year and a half there, the building the market currently sits in came up for sale. Kuhns, who had also purchased Elliott’s Ice Cream, saw it as an opportunity to put all of his ventures into one location and expand into other products.
“My mom started the doughnut business down in Boardman 11 years ago, called Aunt Martha’s Doughnuts,” Kuhns said. “She started that and then she shared the recipe with me when we started this.”
Kuhns combined all three businesses into one in the form of the market, which opened its doors March 9. From there, he kept adding on — the market now sports poly furniture, seasonal flowers, smoothies, a bakery, maple products, ice cream cakes and sundaes, among many other items.
With the summer months hitting Ohio hard, Kuhns has found the shop’s ice cream to be especially popular.
“We probably go through 40 ice cream cakes a week,” he said.
Service is at the forefront of his business, Kuhns said.
“If (customers) have a bad day, they can walk out feeling better,” he said. “The act of service is just as important as the quality of the product and the consistency of the products.”
Though the service isn’t quite where he wants it to be, yet, feedback has been glowingly positive, Kuhns said.
Ratings and comments on the business’s Facebook page illustrate Kuhn’s sentiment — photos of doughnuts are often followed with enthusiastic feedback.
“The public really, you know, they grabbed it,” Kuhns said. “Everybody’s telling each other. The Facebook (page) went from 4,000 followers to 6,500 followers in like six weeks’ time.”
The doughnuts are freshly made, with a crew coming in overnight to prep the goods that are sold the next morning.
The market has seen some slight growing pains in its expansion, having vastly broadened from five employees. New staff requires training, Kuhns explained, adding young employees may not be able to work the full six days the shop is open.
“Our management, the workers that have been with us from the beginning, I believe they do a really good job with helping the new ones get trained and doing it properly and keeping that product consistency and quality,” he said.
The market, as its name implies, is both Amish owned and operated.
“We have four English (non-Amish) drivers that work for us,” Kuhns said, noting the market delivers to 10 different gas stations and businesses every morning.
Kuhns expressed excitement at the growth the market has had in only a few months.
“We did the same amount of doughnuts this Saturday as (Aunt Martha’s Doughnuts) did down there at (Boardman) this Saturday,” he said. “For being only four months in doing the same exact amount of doughnuts that they did after 11 years is pretty exceptional.”
The market is something like a smaller version of the Amish Market in Boardman, Kuhns said, adding, however, while Boardman’s market hosts numerous vendors, everything at the Middlefield market is under one owner.
It was his family working at the Boardman market that originally got Kuhns into the food industry.
“I had no food background history at all. I didn’t think in the food business. And just said, ‘I’m gonna try it,’” Kuhns recounted. “I’d seen it was a business that, with a little bit of attention and some hard work, was something that has a good opportunity.”
The business’s goal is to do better every day, he said.
“The prior business I was in, I always had to go out and look for work. Here, I don’t need to go look for customers, they find me. I just have to strive to keep my product quality there and the service,” he said, noting word of mouth from happy customers is a great form of advertisement.
Though Kuhns currently has his hands full with the rapidly-growing business, he does have a vision for the future.
“In the future, I definitely want to have the management here to where I can depend on maybe two to three people that are really serious, you know, see the vision the way I see it,” he said. “To where I can possibly expand a little more with more going outside, starting more accounts and more deliveries, doing large orders.”
The business is already delving into some large orders, he added, noting they have worked for Amish tournaments and weddings.
“My goal is to have top quality products and exceptional service,” he said. “And my goal is to make the customer feel like they’re a part of something — make them have a better day after they walk out of here.”
The Amish Country Market is open 5 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday and 5 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday. For more information, call 440-313-6230 or visit the market Facebook page by searching The Pretzel Bar or Amish Country Market.
