Center City hoagie shop profits off small prices

For a month now, spies have been slipping into a nondescript shop near Jewelers Row. Their mission, according to witnesses, was urgent.

"Espionage," said Pam Bonfiglio, who has watched each glide down the long hall past her and her husband's jewelry shop, aiming for a tucked-away room with white walls.

The spooks' target: an insurgent hoagie maker in baseball cap, shorts, and sneakers. A Vietnam War veteran, barely 5-foot-7. A Marine, 67, named Fink.

According to eyewitness Joseph Bonfiglio, Pam Bonfiglio's husband, one pizza delivery guy infiltrated Fink's sandwich shop on 132 S. Eighth St. on orders from his boss.

"Got five sandwiches," said Bonfiglio, "to pick them apart and see what the heck is going on."

The competition is on high alert because Dennis Fink, an unassuming Northeast Philadelphia hoagie maker, has launched a guerrilla attack on Center City's highfalutin' culinary-industrial complex.

Fink is pulling off what should be impossible in 2015: He has brought the low prices and modest sandwiches of rowhouse Tacony to red-hot Center City. And he has done so with an assist from fellow commando and landlord Bonfiglio, who decided to take a hit on rent to clear the way.

At Fink's, a can of soda is 60 cents, a 23-ounce bottle of water is a buck, and a hoagie on a fresh, seeded Liscio's roll is $6.48.

A half block away, people drop $4,000 a month on two-bedroom pads at the St. James Place tower. Gov. Wolf lives there when in town.

So what if Fink and Bonfiglio could make tons more charging more? They are giddily stirring things up in uppity downtown.

"I mean, how much do you want to make?" Fink said Wednesday, pointing to a refrigerator holding bottled and canned drinks that consist of Pepsi, water, and only a few other staples. "You've got to be fair with people. It's water."

"Nickels and dimes, you end up making dollars," Fink said. He makes his money, in other words, by making more sandwiches and catered trays - not by charging an arm and a leg.

Four weeks into Fink's brazen invasion, the shop is selling as many hoagies as Fink sells at his location in Tacony, which has been in business for about 12 years.

For that, Fink can thank the specialty hoagies he named for Northeast neighborhoods, served on bread delivered each dawn from South Jersey, at the exact same prices he charges in Tacony.

But Fink would be nowhere near Center City without Bonfiglio, 63, who just knew this would work.

Bonfiglio and his wife sampled Fink's hoagies after a jewelry client from the Northeast brought a few down one day.

"I took one bite of his vegetarian hoagie and I said, he's got to come here," Pam Bonfiglio recalled.

Bonfiglio has owned the building since the 1970s, operating American Jewelry Co. from the portion that fronts the sidewalk. He and his father had planted stakes near Jewelers Row during downtown's more egalitarian heyday.

That might be one reason why Fink and Bonfiglio fast became, in the words of Pam Bonfiglio, "kindred spirits."

Both came from close to nothing. Both were raised by World War II combat veterans who dropped out of high school to fight the Axis. Both served in the military during Vietnam, though only Fink saw combat.

Put both guys in the same room for more than five minutes and they start to compare notes about how little they made while serving during the war.

"I made $115, plus $65 in combat pay," Fink says. Both laugh at the sum.

No wonder, then, that as Center City has gentrified, Bonfiglio has taken note of more than just the soaring value of his asset.

Affordable food has started to disappear. With buildings selling for millions, rents have soared, turning mom-and-pop delis into an endangered species as celebrity chefs and chain restaurants swoop in.

Bonfiglio couldn't shake the idea that an affordable sandwich could still be a star.

"I'll eat anything that isn't nailed down," he says.

He wondered if Fink could be the guy to prove him right.

"I wasn't interested in the money," Bonfiglio said. "I was interested in him. He had an excellent product, and he had a price that I knew would work here."

Bonfiglio sent word to Fink. He had a vacancy. How about giving it a shot?

"I can't afford to be down here," Fink replied. "My thing is, I'm from the neighborhood. I try to keep my prices at neighborhood prices, because the economy is bad all over."

Fink gave in, though, when Bonfiglio named a number: a five-year lease that costs less per month for an 1,100-square-foot shop than many middle-class homeowners pay on a mortgage.

Fink has been thrilled, even as he works seven days a week. Even though his wife, Patti, 53, a trauma nurse, is only now starting to bounce back from taxing treatments associated with a rare cancer.

"I see it as a challenge," Fink said, with the bright smile that makes him seem hardly a year over 55.

"I came to Center City to succeed," he said. "And I will."

215-854-2431 @Panaritism