In Westerly, family means business

January 31, 2015 11:00 pm • Last Updated: February 02, 2015 5:37 pm

By By ANN BALDELLI Day Staff Writer

Customers step up to the meat counter Friday at Westerly Packing Co. The family owned and operated business offers freshly butchered meats and store-made sausages and cheeses, as well as an array of other products, many of them Italian, all in service of its retail and wholesale customers.

Great-great-grandsons run mostly Italian market with retail and wholesale customers in mind

Westerly - It's almost all authentic Italian at Westerly Packing Co., where even the popular meatball mix is made with a recipe that came to America in 1892 when Francesco Bruno left Calabria searching for a better opportunity for his family.

One of the first Italians to settle in Westerly, Bruno opened a fruit and grocery store in the same Peasant Street neighborhood where he made a home for his family. Today, decades after Bruno started his business in the early 1900s, his great-great grandsons are running the operation that is now in the White Rock section of town and has evolved into Westerly Packing Company, a retail and wholesale meat market, Italian grocery, and much, much more.

Retail customers can shop at the busy meat counter, where there is always a meat cutter on duty and the meatball mix is made at least twice daily, to keep up with demand. And there's the house-made soupy - a dry sausage that comes in sweet, mild, hot and triple hot - and is shipped all across the country to aficionados who've sampled Westerly Packing's soupy and want it again.

They also make their own sausage - hot and mild, breakfast, and chicken - and smoke hams and bacon. And, in addition to the soupy that's cured in climate-controlled drying rooms where customers can see it hanging through a showroom window, they also make prosciutto and capicolo.

But there's even more at Westerly Packing, including grocery aisles that are filled with imported and domestic items, such as olives, vinegars, olive oils, spices, coffees, and a dizzying array of pastas, including whole wheat and gluten-free. Much of the stock is imported from Italy.

There are fresh olives, a wide selection of cheeses, many Italian, and sundries such as napkins, toilet paper and condiments. They even have bushel baskets filled with colossal, fresh-smoked dog bones.

Since Westerly Packing sells to restaurants, it has what is called the "wholesale aisle," where retail customers can shop for oversized cans and boxes of fruits and sauces and other products, and from refrigerators and freezers stocked with economy-size bundles of cheese, meat, fish, poultry and anything else you may want to buy in bulk for an event or party.

"If a customer wants it, we try to provide it," said Bruno Trombino, the business manager at Westerly Packing and great-great grandson of Francesco Bruno, for whom he is named.

Trombino's mother, Palma, the great-granddaughter of Francesco Bruno, still works daily at Westerly Packing with her husband, Medoro Trombino, and their other son, Medoro II.

"We're a family-run business," Bruno Trombino said, "and I wouldn't sell anything here that I wouldn't put on my own table."

Achieving balance

Decades ago, Francesco Bruno's son, Rico, added meats to the family business and changed the name to Bruno's Meat Market.

After Rico's son, Frank Anthony Bruno took over the business in 1960, he moved it from the populated Pleasant Street area to the more rural Springbrook Road, so he could add a slaughterhouse.

Palma and Medoro Trombino changed the name and focus of the business when they took over in 1978, establishing Westerly Packing Co. as both a walk-in and wholesale business.

Son Bruno Trombino said the couple adapted to the times by figuring out how to serve its restaurants as well as its loyal retail customers.

Today, Westerly Packing has found a balance to meet the needs of both its commercial and retail patrons.

It's been a USDA-inspected facility for more than 50 years, and prides itself on high quality, cleanliness, and custom service.

If a customer wants a steak or chicken cut a certain way, the butcher will do it. Ask for advice on what Italian cheese to pair with soupy, the processor who makes it will come out to the cheese counter and make recommendations.

And if there's a request, Westerly Packing will fill it.

For wine-makers, they bring in 40-pound crates of red and white grapes from California in the fall and they sell everything else that's necessary, from a wine press to bottles and corks.

For St. Patrick's Day, there's barrel-brined corned beef, and a couple weeks later, there's basket cheese to mix with soupy for the Easter fritatta and of course lamb, tenderloins, and all the other provisions.

Westerly Packing even added a shelf of protein powders for body builders who were coming in anyway for chicken breasts and other lean protein.

There's been no slaughterhouse at Westerly Packing for decades, but they do have their own farm and will butcher a whole pig or cow for a customer, or just sell it by the pound.

And working in conjunction with Rhode Island's slaughterhouse, they cut and freezer-pack meat from local farmers, enabling those farmers to sell their own animals at farmers markets or other outlets.

A new addition is planned for later this year, and in addition to a second smokehouse, it will include space to make and sell prepared foods, like lasagnas, sausage and peppers, and other ready-to-eat dishes. They're also adding a new cooler to butcher and package deer for local hunters.

"We do a lot of things here," said Bruno Trombino, who graduated from the University of Rhode Island in 1994 with a degree in business management.

There was a time when Trombino considered becoming a pharmacist, but like his relatives before him, he decided instead to join the family business.

"I grew up here," he said. "My mom grew up in the business. It's all 100 percent Italian."

a.baldelli@theday.com

Twitter: @annbaldelli