The Secret Life of Groceries: The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket

by Benjamin Lorr

In particular, Saunders is inspired by a new type of novelty restaurant called the “cafeteria.” If we want to think about the introduction of the supermarket as a birth, the cafeteria was foreplay. During the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, John Kruger builds a temporary American “smorgasbord” restaurant where patrons can peruse a series of different options. In 1898, Childs Restaurant in New York riffs on this structure, giving each customer a tray and asking them to walk single file down a line selecting their food from various steaming pans. The result is a sensation that sweeps across the country. Career male waiters in their starched white uniforms are out, their job now easily done by just one or two perky young women.