kept thinking I was in Disney World. I was close. In 1971, Jim Bonaminio started a tiny produce stand in Fairfield, north of Cincinnati. He added a few giant elephants and giraffes to stop traffic. Then things got exciting.
That tiny stand today is Jungle Jim’s International Market, six acres of the wildest food market on earth with 350 employees catering to what Jim calls “foodies.” You could go and not spend a cent and still have a memorable time. I’m not over it yet.
In our era of look-alike supermarkets, this is a splash in the face from an elephant trunk. Jim is a crafty food retailer, but he has this thing about taking his store to the edge. The result is as much a tourist attraction as a grocery.
His parking lot fills every day with cars from all over. Those folks are greeted by a pond of spraying elephants and giraffes and loud animal noises from hidden speakers.
And that’s only the start. A lot of this looks like Disney World. There are two (fake) monorails outside. The store is organized like the International Street at Epcot Center, with each nation getting its due in favorite foods and Jim’s music and decor.
Check out the eight aisles of the British area, dominated by a full-scale Sherwood Forest and an animated Robin Hood shooting arrows, a fat Friar Tuck and Maid Marian on a full-size horse. The Jim touch: Everything is aerial. The forest with 30-foot trees sits atop the food displays. You walk underneath it, staring at the subterranean rocks and dirt and suddenly discovering Robin’s buried treasure cache — upside down, of course. It’s more than freaky. I cannot imagine it ever leaving my mind.
Jim is a fearless leader who never tempers his love of things. He scours the world for food and for “Jim’s stuff” as the employees say. He is a demanding boss, but ever amazing as he creates new concepts for his “stand.”
Every world has its own Jim stuff, from his worldwide license-plate and fire-department patches to the entire fire engine, his icon sitting atop more bottles of hot sauce than anyplace else. There’s a three-wheeled jitney from India over his pile after pile of bags of Indian rice. We have an animated Pedro over the Mexican, and on and on, including Jim’s nutty signs and oh yes, the walk-in Beer Cave and a live fish “biopond” where you eat the entertainers.
The only downside is like at Disney World, how much fun can you have until your feet give out. Jim’s genius: His aerial entertainment never gets in the way of selling on the floor. His food selection is complete and in huge amounts. He has enough habanero peppers to supply Canton for a decade. He has camel steaks. He has every variety of edible cacti. And the turnover is as massive as his distributor chain.
As with Disney World, all this changes folks as they walk through the door. Everybody suddenly seems friendly and oohing and ahing and laughing together. If you’re perplexed about what to do with a prickly pear, there’s somebody with a recipe. A lot of the customers are from other lands, suddenly discovering what they left behind. These folks are as fun as Jim’s notorious sense of humor.
So we arrive at the “award winning” rest rooms. How can that be? Here are the plastic doors of Port-a-Potties. I’m thinking, Jim, what are you thinking? So I open the men’s door and my bladder skips a beat. Symphony music, a beautifully lighted art gallery, and oh yes, the most modern toilets at the end. I’ve never spent so much time in the men’s room.
Amid the surprising and the madcap, I suddenly noticed my cart was empty. Were we not here to buy groceries? So I went into shopping mode, expecting high prices to pay for this fun. Then came yet another surprise.
I found excellent values. I bought a container of imported bleu cheese, 16 ounces for what three cost here. I found my favorite poblano peppers at near-wholesale price (they were fresh, unlike the soft ones here). Bananas, 19 cents per pound; choice boneless beef rump roast, $1.99; premium chocolate milk, 2 1/2 gallons for $5.
Jim does not gouge. With his volume, he doesn’t have to. His sales total around $100 million a year. I’d say if you’re in the Dayton or Cincy area, this is not to be missed. Schedule 3 to 4 hours at Jungle Jim’s. And Kings Island, eat your heart out.