“great tasting food prepared with clean ingredients.”

Grandpa Gavro opens a specialty Greek store in Quincy, MA.

In the early 70’s, grandpa Gavro or as the name is spelled in English: Gavros, opened a little produce and specialty Greek store in Quincy MA. His American friends could not say his name, Sotirios, so he got nicknamed, Sam. He sold Greek import products, fruits, and vegetables among other things out of this tiny storefront. Our founder, George grew up in this store peddling strawberries on weekends, pumpkins ahead of Halloween and Christmas trees ahead of the holidays. 

Award-winning science project

In the late 80’s when our founder was looking for a science project topic, he remembered how bad peeled potatoes smelled back then with all the sulfites that were used to keep them white and so he embarked on a 4 year science project on how to better preserve potatoes using naturally occurring and better for you preservatives. His solutions were ahead of their time, and demonstrated that antioxidant acids such as vitamin c and citric acid could replace the sulfites. George took his science project to the Massachusetts State Science Fair each year, held at the MIT gym (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). What makes this topic real funny is that fast forward three and a half decades, the Gavros family is back in that gym, George’s daughter Daphne competes for MIT’s volleyball team in that same gym, still without air conditioning.

The launch of Zoe’s Meats

Eighteen years ago, George launched Zoe’s Meats (2007), where once again he was using naturally occurring preservatives to prepare food products.  This time, it was meat products. Named after the younger daughter, Zoe, the company grew first on menus in the San Francisco Bay Area and then nationally. In 2013, efforts to build the brand in retail began and the same great artisan products that chefs had branded on their menus became a part of what chefs at home were consuming daily when they were looking for bacon, salamis, deli meats etc.

Pickles by gavro provisions

As you can see, the concept of gavro provisions has been in the making since the mid-1980’s taking on many different names, different projects but the highlight has always been the same: great tasting food prepared with clean ingredients. Our first product line under the gavro provisions brand: pickled cucumbers. Prepared without preservatives and coloring agents.

The Future

But rest assured, the idea of gavro provisions will be much more than just pickles as the months and years roll by. Follow us on IG etc.