By Casey Neill
Danny Luppino has been a Dandenong Market fixture for 54 years.
And the Italian-born 74-year-old wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I love the shop, I love the customers, the market, the council…,” he said.
“They’re like family here.”
Danny followed his brother to Australia.
“My eyes were opening because I was a truck driver in Italy,” he said.
“I saw this beautiful country…
“I started to work with my brother at South Melbourne Market.”
It was open Wednesdays and Fridays.
“I looked for another day of work. Dandenong was open on Tuesday,” he said.
Soon he was operating a stall on one side of Dandenong Market and his brother covered the other side.
“Since then – 1962 – I’ve kept going,” Danny said.
“Once they opened Friday here I left South Melbourne and I concentrated here.
“Then they opened Saturday here and I left Richmond – I was at Richmond Market on Saturday morning – and I concentrated just on Dandenong.
“The last 35 years I’ve been here just in Dandenong.”
The market introduced Sunday trading two years ago.
“It’s getting better and better. Sunday is becoming one of the best days,” he said.
Danny boasts that everyone at the market knows him.
“The customers come in and come straight to my shop. I do my best to make the customers happy,” he said.
“When we started there was no self-service. We would serve the customer.
“The customer wasn’t allowed to touch anything.
“Thirty years ago that changed.
“When we started, if the stuff was a little bit damaged you had the chance to sell it.
“The new generation, if it’s no good they say ‘eat it yourself’.
“They want to pay less but it’s got to be good.”
But one thing hasn’t changed.
“You get a good name and the customers come back,” he said.
Danny prides himself on providing fresh produce that will last at least a week in the fruit bowl.
“When you buy, you buy number one,” he said.
“You go for quality, you pay a bit more and you get it back and the customer’s happy.”
His brother passed away 10 years ago, but another Luppino is still by Danny’s side.
“My son Domenic wants to take over the business,” he said.
“He loves this job.
“He started here when he was about seven years old.
“He was coming with me Saturdays and school holidays.
“He loved it and he’s still here.”
Domenic is now 44 and, Danny claims, is “taking over now”.
“He’s the boss!”
Domenic laughed off the claim.
“He still calls the shots, don’t you worry about that,” he said.
He said the 1am starts did wear him down but he loved “the special people in Dandenong, the variety of different people, really”.
“I enjoy serving the customers. It’s all I know,” he said.
Dandenong Market 150th
Enjoy these other stories at the Journal celebrates 150 years of the Dandenong Market:
Birthday party in store
From livestock to market stalls
History captures moments in time
Fruit stall stays in the family
Stall selling is their stock in trade
