By John Temple Ligon
Photo by John Temple Ligon
Photo by John Temple Ligon
Basil Garzia, Lehigh–educated economist, runs Rosewood Market, the green building on Rosewood Drives’ north side, near Rockaway’s and the Steak Mart and next to Rosewood Baptist Church. He’s been there in that building, his building, for over 16 years.
Before Lehigh University Garzia graduated from high school in Cohoes, near Troy, NY. His father was a carpet man as they watched the manufacturing move South to Upstate SC.
Almost immediately after Lehigh, Garzia joined VISTA, America’s domestic Peace Corps. VISTA put him into Newberry County, and Newberry County led him to Columbia two years later.
Garzia got into the restaurant business down the street from his current location on Rosewood. He located next door to the Rosewood Lounge in 1973 as The Basil Pot, then Columbia’s dominant vegetarian restaurant.
Basil Garzia in front of Rosewood Market
The Rosewood Lounge was known for its Pabst Blue Ribbon draughts at a quarter each and for its no–women policy – for that matter, no communists and no long– hairs, either. The Rosewood Lounge was run by Doc, a former Spartanburg pharmacist.
Doc shut down about 1975, and The Basil Pot moved to South Main.
Garzia sold The Basil Pot in 1981 and started Rosewood Natural Foods, moving to his own building in 1989.
Rosewood Market has about 3,800 square feet on the sales floor, and that includes the restaurant section with its open kitchen and indoor seating. The diners inside sit next to the health foods bookstore. In an al fresco setting shaded by huge trees and pergola fixtures, the outdoor diners overlook Maple Street and their neighbor The Steak Mart on the other side.
A mixed blessing, the Publix Super Market across Rosewood generates traffic as an anchor for all of its immediate neighbors. As a fully stocked grocery, though, the Publix glowers across Rosewood as competition on a number of items. The heavier competition, however, is the rare health food grocery operation scattered around Columbia.
The grocery business is getting a little like the airlines. Delta and US Airways are merging with upstarts or becoming more like them out of envy and maybe too much competition coming from the improvising sorts like Southwest or America West. It’s a compliment, really, but the smaller operators may not see it that way because that way can hurt.
The Rosewood Market’s relationships with local producers and growers make for interesting business bedfellows and extraordinary food offerings.
Garzia gets eggs from Wil–Moore Farms on Ridgeway Road in Lugoff, on the road to Camden. The farm–fresh eggs are labeled as “Free Ranging on Pasture” and “Free from Antibiotics & Hormones.”
Garzia’s grits include “Anson Mills Organic Quick Grits” from nearby. And he imports rice, cowpeas, and more grits from the shores of the Great Pee Dee River at Plumfield Plantation. Plumfield’s brand is “Carolina Plantation,” owned by Darlington County’s Coxe family, in this case Campbell Coxe, the same people who founded the hunt club called Damon, 20,000 acres dedicated to place appreciation and good shooting.
Garzia gets pasture– raised pork from Caw Caw Creek in Calhoun County – from Emile DeFelice, actually. And one of his milk brands is “Happy Cow Creamery” from Tom Trantham in Pelzer.
Garzia can be a purist when it comes to personal preferences, but he is very much a businessman, too. And he sells what is sought. There is a meat counter displaying fresh fowl and other white meat. The smoked turkey is free of antibiotics and hormone treatments. The chicken sausage is nitrate–free. The smoked salmon is about as good as it gets at any top–tier wedding reception.
The old odd setting where the mechanic drives a trap and the carpenter lives in a dump is not the case with Garcia. The grocer eats what he prefers, and his family lives well.
Garzia’s daughter is 11 and is taught at home by her mother, 10 years a state employee at Vocational Rehab.
Rosewood Market is something of the food merchant’s version of the Happy Bookseller: local, very local, and replete with superior local service, straight from the owner.
Basil Garzia
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