For Pat Nicastro, the morning always starts with an espresso – the first of many he’ll enjoy from the opening to the close of his ByWard Market grocery store, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.
A lot has changed for La Bottega Nicastro over the past three decades, but for its owners, the days are as busy as ever.
“We started off here with four employees,” he says. “We were busy from day one. I was working seven days. Funny enough, I’m still working just as much as I was back then. That hasn’t changed, but I have a little more help now.”
OBJ360 (Sponsored)
Entrepreneurial success builds Westboro Village community
Westboro Village’s well-deserved reputation as a delightful community in which to live and work has been enhanced by the presence of many locally owned businesses. They are assisted by the
Regional Group races ahead in the net-zero game
Regional Group is not just talking about sustainability—it’s showing what’s possible. As the first real estate company to join the Ottawa Retrofit Accelerator (ORA) program, delivered by Hydro Ottawa, Regional
I stopped by La Bottega Nicastro on a sunny Friday morning in January for a tour of the shop and a peek behind the scenes to get a sense of what a typical day in Nicastro’s life looks like.
When I arrive, he’s outside with his daughter, helping her with her car while simultaneously chatting with a neighbour. It’s a theme throughout our meeting – Nicastro knows all his regulars by name.
At the shop, days start early and they always start the same way.
“The first thing we all do, a few of the managers and I, as soon as I walk in, we go to the coffee bar and we have our first espresso,” he says. “That’s not negotiable. And we have a little meeting and talk about the plan for the day. That’s the first espresso of the day. That keeps us going.”
“How many espressos do you have in a day?” I ask.
He laughs: “Probably at least 10.”
Top of the priority list is cleaning and inventory, making sure the shop is fully stocked for when the doors open at 9 a.m. For a business in the Market, getting products off delivery trucks and onto shelves is a tricky logistical challenge, according to Nicastro.
“Operating a business in the Market, or any downtown, is very difficult,” he says. “People are amazed we have no loading docks here. Everything has to come in from the front of the store. We’re talking pallets, every day, that get delivered and dropped off on the street. It’s not a normal grocery store. There’s a lot happening.”
With shelves full of produce, meats and dairy products such as cheese, Nicastro says part of the morning’s tasks is making sure everything is fresh and easy on the eye.
“I always tell my staff we’re only as good as the store looks that day,” he explains.
On top of that, La Bottega needs to be ready for lunch, a process that gets the kitchen and staff members rolling right away.
“I love the mornings because you walk in and you smell the fresh pasta sauces,” he says. “You smell the fresh bread coming out of the oven. Croissants. The slice of deli meats. The parmigiano being cut. It’s a fun time.”
According to Nicastro, it’s also essential, since the lunch rush is the busiest time of day.
“We’re packed every day for lunch,” he says. “Our volume increases tenfold. If we’re not ready for lunch, we’re in trouble. So I’m leading the team to make sure everything’s ready.”
The shop is known for its sandwich bar, where customers pop by to order deli sandwiches customized to their tastes, as well as its coffee bar, where patrons can grab an espresso and perhaps a pastry.
A newer addition is the small sit-down restaurant tucked into a back corner, which has also become a popular lunch spot.
Other business owners in the Market are regulars at this time of day, Nicastro says, popping by to chat and, yes, enjoy an espresso. Chefs from nearby restaurants are also often coming in to buy supplies and ingredients.
It’s a tight-knit community, according to Nicastro, but since the pandemic it’s been a challenging landscape, with some longtime tenants forced to shut their doors.
But Nicastro said it’s not the first time, and it won’t be the last.
“When we came here to the Market in 1995, the Market was having some issues. It was a bit of a recession and all these businesses were closed. Basically, we took a risk because we believed in it,” he recalls. “We’ve seen it all. The area has had lots of ups and downs.”
Over the years, La Bottega has grown to include a full catering department. During the pandemic, it introduced online shopping and local delivery service, all of which has allowed it to survive financial challenges.
“We’ve grown every year,” he says. “We pivot, we’ve had to change and we focus on where we see the Market going. There’s always struggles, but what keeps us going is we always hear ‘We need Bottega here’ from the residents. We’re so grateful to hear all the compliments.”
Staying competitive against big grocery stores requires keeping an eye out for new opportunities. Almost every day, Nicastro says he researches and meets with salespeople to bring new products in and curate an ever-changing selection of inventory for customers.
“Sometimes there’s a lineup of three or four people here to see me who want to know how they can get their product in our shop and we’re buying,” he says. “In the grocery business, buying is probably the most important thing we do. If you don’t know how to buy, you’re in trouble. There’s a lot of competition out there and we have to know what’s going on in the industry.”
But Nicastro has an advantage. A fifth-generation food merchant, his family still has grocery stores in Italy, allowing him to stay on top of the trends in Europe before they make their way overseas.
“We spend a month in Italy, in Calabria, every year,” he says. “We mix a bit of business and pleasure. My father, my grandfather, my great-grandfather, they were all food merchants. We invested years ago in olives and producing olive oil in Italy and we import it for our stores. So we’re there. We’re lucky to have those connections and still have a foot in what’s going on in Italy. We’re always one step ahead of the chains.”
He adds, “Italy is an important part of our story and we try to bring Italy home to Ottawa.”
Even 30 years later, Nicastro says his work is still his great passion. Every evening, he has no problem sticking around until it’s time to close, although that time period is looking a little different than it used to.
“After four o’clock used to be the second-busiest time of the day. Whereas now it’s not, because there’s not as much of an after-work crowd,” says Nicastro. “After COVID, we haven’t rebounded. Less people are working downtown, so for us, that was the biggest change. The people who still live in the area still support us immensely, but we found now we’ve become a bit of a destination. People used to work in the area. Now they’re coming down to the Market to make it a trip.”
In recent months, traffic has started going up on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, when more federal employees are in the area. But the store’s biggest customer base remains ByWard Market residents, who have been shopping for decades. And after 30 years in business, Nicastro says some of those relationships have become generational.
“You’ll see the nonnas, the Italian grandmothers, coming in and I have a very soft spot for these customers,” he says. “I saw them when I was working for my dad when I was younger and now they’re shopping in my store. It’s so rewarding and so pleasant to see these Italian customers still coming in and now they’re bringing their children and grandchildren.”
