For a decade, V. Miller Meats stood as one of Sacramento’s last independent butcher shops, advocating for high-quality, locally sourced meats while teaching customers responsible meat consumption.
It closed two weeks ago despite its popularity. Owner Eric Veldman Miller told Insight Host Vicki Gonzalez that a combination of challenges from rising costs and economic strain to shifts in consumer habits led to the closure.
“Over the last few years, everything went up and the only thing that didn’t go up was our customer visits,” he said. “It just got to a point where I was not breaking even but just digging a hole.”
Eric Veldman Miller at V. Miller Meats.(Courtesy/Eric Veldman Miller)
The usual holidays he relied on saw less business for Miller, which he attributed to the state of the economy and prices from big box stores he couldn’t compete with.
Father’s Day, he said, was down by 35 to 40 percentage points from what he usually expects and Fourth of July sales were low because of extreme heat.
The trend continued through Thanksgiving, which made Miller worried about the future of his business. One day, Miller said he heard an advertisement on the radio for a big box grocery store advertising prime rib at a fraction of the cost he was selling them for.
“They were selling rib roasts for $7 a pound, and I’m of the same ilk of, ‘I have to look after my money and whether I’m going to spend $300 on a roast or if I’m going to end up spending $100 on a roast,’” he said. “That’s a really big gap. I definitely understand the way that feels on your pocketbook.”
The independent butcher shop's closure also worried some local farmers and ranchers, like Riverdog Farm owner Tim Mueller, who rely on local restaurants and shops like Miller's.
Riverdog Farm
Mueller has owned and operated his Capay Valley-based farm since 1996 with the goal of creating a food system that is “better for everyone.” He said that for the past 3 years, V. Miller Meats was an important piece of his program.
“Eric is an honorable person of great integrity and it is very sad to see him have to close his store,” he said. “It's a real loss to the community.”
Many of Mueller's local customers didn't return to him after the COVID-19 pandemic, so losing Miller's business was a “psychological and financial” shock to him.
“We, on the produce and meat level in most zones, get paid less now than we did 5 years ago, but the cost to their ultimate retail customer is higher,” he said. “People like [Eric Miller] who honor their farmers and give a good return to the farmer are few and far between, and they're struggling just as local farmers are. The psychological impact is big because we're losing another key player in the local food movement.”
Riverdog Farm owner Tim Mueller holds a hog's head in one of his farm's freezers Saturday, July 3, 2021, in Guinda.(Gerardo Zavala/CapRadio)
Since the pandemic, Mueller also said he employs fewer people largely because he doesn't work with large wholesale retailers anymore. Competition with imported produce prices have made that impossible, especially considering that his farm provides year-round jobs with health insurance and fair wages.
“We focus more on our community-supported agriculture, our farmers markets, our more regional distributors and a whole bevy of restaurants in Sacramento that support us directly,” he noted.
Mueller argued that supporting local restaurants and local markets is how people can connect to their local farms.
“It increases our overall food security when you have strong local farms taking care of the ecosystem around Sacramento, and taking care of the local community as well,” he added. “The farms are part of the fabric of a community.”
Taylor's Market
Sacramento butcher Danny Johnson said being a butcher is all he ever wanted to do — besides play pro baseball. He's been a butcher for over 40 years and has owned Taylor's Market, a corner store located along Freeport Boulevard, since 1987. In that time, he's seen the slow decline of independently-owned butcher shops like Miller's.
“When I started in Sacramento, just on Freeport Boulevard there was four other independent butcher shops,” he said. “In the city limits, off the top of my head I could think of six within a five-mile radius of Taylor's.”
However, as the demographics and the market have changed, Johnson said “People just don't use an independent butcher shop like they used to.”
“We're the type of place that we used to have all over in this town and other cities,” he added. “We're kind of a throwback.”
Johnson said he warned Miller of the challenges of being the first independent butcher-only shop to open in Sacramento in several years.
“People like to pick up their bread, their produce, maybe some dry goods and wine or whatever they want to drink all in one shop,” he said. “It's not a good look for the industry when a butcher shop closes, but that business model is not a sustainable business model. It's been proven nationally.”
While the closure of Miller's butcher shop doesn't worry him, increased meat prices have had an impact on his business.
“Even though butcher shops like mine or Eric's have a reputation for being higher priced, bang for your buck and what you're actually getting, you can't compare apples to apples to the big chains or a Costco,” he said. “The difference with going to a place like ours or Eric's is you're dealing with a butcher.”
Johnson also noted that supporting local butchers like his means supporting small businesses that give back to the community.
“When you're looking for a donation for Little League or to sell your campfire cookies out in front of the store, you get an answer right there from an owner who is there every day and engaged versus corporations where you gotta go through this whole chain,” he said. “If you go look at different little leagues around, all the sponsors are small businesses. If you don't support small businesses, that dries up, then we end up with just a big monopoly.”
Taylor's Market supports two local little league teams — the Padres and Majors — which Johnson said is his way of letting kids pursue his own dream of becoming a professional baseball player.
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