Some towns lose their downtown. Cleveland kept its, and Gardner's Market is a big part of the reason people still walk Broad Street at lunchtime. We have been making sandwiches to order in the historic Roan-Thompson building since 1992.
The recipe has never been complicated. Good bread, all-natural meats sliced in house, and a counter where the person making your sandwich knows the regulars by name. That has not changed through the years, and it is not going to.
Step inside and it feels like a place that has been here a while: vintage signs, comic books under glass, a red phone booth in the corner, and the smell of muffins coming out of the oven.
Part Deli, Part Market
One side of the room is a working deli, a long board of sandwiches sorted by protein, hot dogs done five ways, and house sides made fresh that morning. The other side is the market: the kind of shelves you browse slowly, stocked with finds you will not see at the chain store.
The muffins deserve their own sentence. Baked jumbo every morning, gone by lunch, and the thing a lot of people drive downtown for in the first place.
Family-Run, Still
Gardner's Market is owned and run by the Holsomback family, who keep the doors open Monday through Friday and treat every order like their name is on it, because it is. Come in for a sandwich, stay for the atmosphere, and you will understand why people keep coming back.
Jimmy & Tonya Holsomback, Owners
