Courtesy / KW Commercial Group at Keller Williams Realty
The seller had owned 72 Main St., now called Mainely Provisions, for over four decades and was looking to retire.
Updated: August 22, 2023
A Maine business owner with a range of holdings buys Bethel supermarket
Courtesy / Mainely Provisions
From left, Ryan Rother, head of grocery; Joe Christopher, owner and CEO; Carl Glidden, previous owner of Bethel Foodliner for 44 years; Kim Christopher, CFO; and Ben Christopher, managing partner.
A longtime entrepreneur with businesses in outdoor recreation and hospitality bought his first grocery store in 2019 and recently expanded that part of his portfolio with a supermarket in Bethel.
Joe Christopher bought the Bethel Shop 'n Save business and real estate at 72 Main St. and a neighboring mixed-use building at 82 Main St. from Carl Glidden for an undisclosed price.
Katie Treem of the Nichols & Treem Real Estate Group at Keller Williams Realty and Kirk Butterfield of Magnusson Balfour/KW Commercial Group at Keller Williams Realty brokered the deal.
Glidden had owned the supermarket for over four decades and was looking to retire, said Treem.
The U.S Postal Service is on the ground floor of 82 Main St., which also has apartments on the upper story.
As a longtime friend of Christopher, Treem said, she was aware of his business interests.
“I came to him with opportunities that fit in his wheelhouse and this was one of the opportunities,” she said.
Christopher, a Brunswick native, became a whitewater raft guide in his early 20s.
In 1997, he was 25 when he opened his own rafting business, Three Rivers Whitewater in West Forks, a plantation in Somerset County. He started with two rafts, paddles and lifejackets for up to 20 people. Today, the business offers a range of water- and land-based excursions, rentals and hospitality offerings, with 15 guides and a second location in Millinocket.
Christopher recently sold the company to its longtime manager, who is also a friend. The sale was in keeping with his philosophic outlook.
“Most of my businesses have minority partners who operate the business,” he said. “It provides them with the opportunity to get into the business and build an asset base and leads to stability and wealth, rather than grinding it out for someone else. The two things that drive my thinking are, ‘Don’t pay rent’ and ‘You should work for yourself and be in control of your destiny.’”
A range of business holdings
The success of Three Rivers led to additional enterprises.
In 2005, he started Jump and Raft as a skydiving and rafting outfit in Millinocket. He owned the business for more than a dozen years before selling to the manager.
He owns Inn By the River, a four-season hotel in the Forks and the Sugarloaf Inn in Carrabassett Valley. In Portland, he became managing partner at the Inn on Peaks Island. He bought the iconic Old Port pub Three Dollar Dewey’s, which reopened in 2019 after renovations. He co-founded Upward Management Group, Portland, to provide shared business services, such as a reservation call center, for his businesses and for outside clients. And he added Saltwater Grille in South Portland to his portfolio.
In December 2022, Upward Management Group bought the Porthole Restaurant & Pub, a no-frills establishment that opened in 1929 at 20 Custom House Wharf, just a few blocks up Commercial Street from Three Dollar Dewey’s.
In 2019, Christopher switched gears and bought a grocery and convenience store in Kingfield, near Sugarloaf Mountain.
“It was in the footprint of the Forks, where we were already working,” he said. “It was a no-brainer to me. At the time, it was the biggest deal I’d done — several million dollars.”
He renamed the business Mainely Provisions and Mainely Convenience.
Then 2020 came along.
“While all my other businesses were closed, the grocery business went through the roof,” he said. “So the pandemic pushed me into being a grocery vendor. That’s when I said I really love grocery stores.”
Courtesy / Mainely Provisions
Joe Christopher, right, welcomes his first customer to Mainely Provisions.
His partner in the venture was Ryan Rother, who previously held management positions at grocery chains in Texas and California.
“I had become friends with him scuba diving in Honduras,” Christopher said. “We talked business and we were aligned.”
With the Bethel purchase, Christopher’s nephew Ben, who has completed a supermarket management training program, was brought in as the location’s general manager. Kimberly Christopher is a long-time partner in accounting and operations.
The Bethel store was also renamed Mainely Provisions.
Christopher credited Cooper Bramble, a real estate lending advisor at Maine Street Capital LLC in Portland, for his help in securing financing for the deal.
Financing was provided by Norway Savings Bank and Grow Maine, a small business loan and capital program administered by the Finance Authority of Maine in conjunction with various statewide lending partners.
“FAME has helped me build businesses from day one — I’ve worked with them many times,” said Christopher.
Renovations on the Bethel location included closing it for three days in order to paint the interior, install new signage and begin bringing in new merchandise such as more organic and local vegetables and freshly baked bread.
“We’re bringing the grocery store up to modern food standards,” said Christopher. “We’re still in the middle of remerchandising and that will go on the for the first year.”
Bethel will not be the last Mainely Provisions store, Christopher predicted.
“We’re on the move in grocery,” he said.
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Anonymous
August 22, 2023
Great team, big thinkers, willing to roll up their sleeves to exceed guest expectations. The best is yet to come.
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