PALMER TWP., Pa. - An Italian deli and market with roots in Easton that go back 50 years is expanding.
Giacomo’s Italian Market and Grille plans to open a second location in Palmer Township, at the former Miller’s Paint & Wallpaper building at 4041 William Penn Highway.
Owner Sal Famularo said he hopes to have the new place up and running in the spring.
“Post-COVID, the trend has been to support local – support your small, family-owned businesses,” Famularo said. “So I think the opportunity for me to grow is now.”
Giacomo’s has operated at 700 Cattell St. on College Hill in Easton since 2003. The business began as Giacomo’s Italian Specialties in the 1200 block of Washington Street, founded in 1975 by Sal’s parents Giacomo and Gina. They’re in their 80s now but still involved in the business.
“It’d be a different run if they weren’t here,” Famularo said. “They’re at it every day. All three of us work together five days a week.”
Over the years, Giacomo’s has won numerous Lehigh Valley “best-of” awards and accolades for its cheesesteaks.
Just a few blocks from Lafayette College, it’s popular among college students and longtime customers who buy its homemade sauces and sausage, butchered meats and dry goods.
Besides being a breakfast and lunch spot on Cattell Street, Giacomo’s is an Italian market and deli that sells imported meats, cheeses, olives, desserts and pasta. It’s open 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Saturday.
“Post-COVID, the trend has been to support local – support your small, family-owned businesses. So I think the opportunity for me to grow is now.”Sal Famularo, Giacomo's Italian Market and Grille
Plans for the Palmer shop are to serve lunch and dinner and be open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., Famularo said.
“It’s a smaller-scale store,” he said. “We won’t serve breakfast or carry as many products as we do here (in Easton). But customers will be able to expect the same high-quality goods we have here – homemade sauces and sausage, Italian imports.”
He said the new store will have seating for about 24 people and be managed by longtime employee and manager Brandon Gillen.
An Easton Area High School graduate, Famularo grew up in Palmer Township and had been considering expansion even before the pandemic. The family built the College Hill store into a success story that they couldn’t have imagined in the tiny West Ward space they operated as a deli and specialty shop in the 1970s.
Years later as he was starting out, Sal Famularo used a side of his parents' store to open a grille. When the family opened on Cattell Street in January 2003 – in the former Sal’s Meat Market run by Sal Panto Sr., father of the longtime mayor – the Famularos brought all of the elements of their Washington Street enterprise together.
“We just combined both into one – a combination of my mom and dad’s shop and mine,” Famularo said.
Plans for the Palmer location have been in the works for almost a year, but delays in equipment, manufacturing and contracting have set back his timeline, Famularo said. Crews gutted the inside of the place and have installed much of the equipment. The sign went up on the building outside just a few weeks ago.
“We thought about it for a while – about how another location and one in Palmer Township would be nice,” Famularo said of him and wife Michelle. “We thought we’d give it a go.
“Number one, there’s nothing like it out there. It was just a matter of timing. We were interested and looking at other places but this one feels real comfortable, and we’ll keep our Palmer Township clients happy – they won’t have to go as far.”
