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• Owners of Bombay Indian Grill to open new grocery store

Champaign-Urbana may have more ethnic grocery stores than other towns of comparable size, but most combine foods from different regions. The owner of Bombay Indian Grill wants to specialize his new Indian grocery store. Instead of offering a mix of foods from several regions, their new store will focus on just one. By the end of the year, Bombay Indian Bazaar will join the ethnic grocery store family of Champaign.

The new store is planned to open toward the end of the year at 48 E. Springfield. Ian Joaquin, assistant manager of Bombay Indian Grill, believes that the mere exposure of Indian delicacies and products will bring Indian culture to Champaign-Urbana. In looking at the diversity of students on campus, Joaquin said he realized a large portion of the student body is of Middle Eastern or Asian descent, and felt their needs were not being served. “They should have made [an Indian grocery] years ago,” said Joaquin.

Because of the large Middle Eastern population in Champaign-Urbana, Joaquin thinks it is important to bring Indian culture to those who miss their home cooking (wherever home may be), or allow those who are trying Indian cuisine for the first time to experiment with authentic ingredients. Both temporary residents who want to try Indian cuisine and permanent residents who know Indian cuisine will finally have groceries available to them, according to Joaquin.

“We want to give the community the best deal in town. I know families from Champaign-Urbana who travel to Bloomington, St. Louis, [and] Chicago to buy groceries,” said Joaquin. “No one wants to drive three hours away with today’s price of gas if there’s a 100 percent guarantee that there is better quality and a cheaper price in town,” said Krishna Sharma, owner of Bombay Indian Grill. Sharma said that Bombay Indian Bazaar will be different from other grocery stores because there will be a knowledgeable staff and more freedom to choose among several different brands, not just one or two brands that other grocery stores typically carry.