While family business legacies were once the norm in small towns across the United States, they have become less common over the years. But there are still those second, third and even fourth generation businesses in the lakes area that are keeping local history alive.

The Schaefer name has been known across Nisswa and Brainerd for 111 years now, and their grocery store on Highway 371 south of downtown Nisswa still garners a great deal of respect from the local community.

That is due in no small part to the atmosphere that family ownership imparts on such a location.

Schaefer's Foods did not start out as a grocery store, nor did it start in Nisswa. As a matter of fact, it all started in 1915 at the corner of South Sixth and Maple streets in Brainerd, helmed by Theodore Henry Schaefer.

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