Joe’s Steaks, whose former name sparked protests, will close the Northeast Philadelphia location after 73 years

The 73-year run of a Northeast Philadelphia cheesesteak shop — known for six decades as Chink’s and since 2013 as Joe’s — will end Labor Day weekend.

Owner Joseph Groh said time and economics have caught up to the hole-in-the-wall on Torresdale Avenue near Benner Street in the Wissinoming section, where he started working in 1979 as a teenager.

“I made the decision [to wind down operations] a couple months ago,” Groh said. “It took the weight of the world off my shoulders.” The shop was “super busy” early in the pandemic, he said. He had 17 employees then, mostly part-timers.

Last summer, however, sales started to slip. Now, some days Groh is down to eight workers and must close for the day if key employees cannot come in. When the meat-cutter is out, Groh picks up the knife — explaining why his elbow was wrapped in an ice pack on Wednesday.

The store is open only Thursday to Sunday, and it closes earlier than it had in previous years.

“I enjoyed this business. I’m just tired,” he said. “I’d like to step back and spend time with my grandchildren.”

Groh, 59, bought the shop in 1999 from the family of the founder, Samuel Sherman, a white man known as “Chink.” Classmates gave Sherman the nickname, a slur for people of Asian descent, because of his features.

The shop’s former name made headlines in 2004 when Susannah Park, an Asian American woman, started a campaign to persuade Groh to change it. The movement was countered by customers and neighbors who collected about 10,000 signatures on a petition asking Groh to keep the name.

Groh also said he received threats from people who wanted him to keep the name.

The protests faded. In 2008, four years later, Groh opened a location in South Philadelphia that closed after six months.

By 2013, considering an expansion, Groh decided to change the name. He sought out a PR consultant, David Neff, who came up with the Joe’s Steaks & Soda Shop branding. The new sign went up on April 1, 2013 — to a crowd of largely jeering locals.

Business suffered initially, he told the Daily News. It eventually rebounded.

In April 2015, Groh opened a Joe’s location at the busy intersection of Frankford and Girard Avenues in Fishtown. Free of association with the old name, it draws a steady stream of customers from the nearby bars.

That location will remain open.

The Northeast location’s last day will be Sept. 3, Groh said. After that, he said he would continue to produce Joe’s sandwiches out of the kitchen for the Goldbelly mail-order company. Eventually, he plans to sell the building, where he has spent the last 43 years.

Thinking of Sherman, whom he met as a Frankford High student, he said, “He’d be proud of me knowing that I kept it going all this time.”