Fleishers Craft Butchery - Westport, CT
A familiar face, in a different place. Yes there are Fleishers Craft Butchery shops in Connecticut too; Greenwich and Westport. At this point it is no secret that I am a fan of Fleishers Craft Butchery, and for good reason. I haven't had better meat than what I’ve tried at their shops, and I will always recommend this shop to whomever I meet.
Divone Thompson and I first met back in November, close to the long awaited end of 2020. I was picking up my holiday turkey for a small family dinner at my home in Norwalk, and he was outside, masked and bundled, ensuring that customers received the bird that they ordered. We struck up a conversation and right away I could tell he was very friendly, easy to talk to, and passionate about what he does.
He has been working for Fleishers in Westport since April of 2018, and eventually worked his way up to the Shop Manager position, but his journey in the industry started some time before. He grew up with his mothers cooking and did not develop the desire to learn how to cook for himself until he graduated high school. He started working at Whole Foods, gaining knowledge and experience, which eventually led him to attending the ICC in Manhattan (The International Culinary Center) where the floodgates opened.
He started following industry names like Sam the Cooking Guy, who runs a couple of restaurants in California and a youtube channel, learning to mimic his techniques. As his hunger grew, he pursued a position at Fleishers in April of 2018, and the rest is history. He found something in butchery that people may not initially think you’d find. No, it wasn't a golden ticket hidden between the ribs, it was the flow state, like meditation in motion. In his words “you can zone out and start breaking everything down, and 30 minutes goes by and you see everything you’ve accomplished. It inspires you to do more and see what else you can create”.
This inspiration, whether you are new to the craft or have been in it for years, is what leads Fleishers employees like Divone to seek knowledge and share that knowledge with their customers in an easy to understand manner. He views the art of butchery as something that is very therapeutic, and he works hard so that others can have the same experience as he does.
Divone recognizes that he has grown exponentially personally and professionally since he started at Fleishers, and he credits much of that growth to his co-workers around him. Namely, Sam Masler, a female butcher who shows women can be successful at this craft also, even better than some men. With her positive attitude and recognition of hard work, she inspires Divone to do more and be better every day. In the same manner, Jason Yang or, “the butcher God”, who knows every muscle, tendon and cut, and has a unique approach to everything on the table, inspires Divone to dive deeper with his knowledge and understanding of whole animal butchery.
More than anyone else, it is his late uncle who he attributes his work ethic to. He was a big teddy bear, but he was also an extremely hard worker who kept moving forward no matter what. Divone cares a great deal about the shop and what he does for a living, and he has the example his Uncle set for him to keep moving forward. We should all be so lucky to have someone like that to look up to and make proud. And the teddy bear aspect? He has his moments. When Divone and his team achieve a big goal, he buys them lunch and makes sure they know they are appreciated, and that it is indeed a team effort. That’s part of what makes Fleishers Craft Butchery so great; the people that work there. The mutual respect and support to be found among co-workers of every level leads to a low turnover rate and employees that love what they do.
Fleishers Westport is doing even better this year, with an uptick of approximately 5% in new customers, partially due to the migration from states like New York, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts due to COVID-19. In another way, something we’ve observed in many places, people are paying more attention to what they are putting into their bodies. Customers are starting to understand the value of paying for good quality meat that has been raised right, rather than having it more often at a cheaper price and quality.
This is one of the things that Divone suggests the industry could do better at: educating the public about the very real differences between how their animals are raised from birth to slaughter versus other vendors, and how that impacts the quality of the meat. We agreed that oftentimes members of our communities get sick of hearing the same message over and over that eventually our words fall on deaf ears. People have so much going on in their lives that it becomes redundant and uninteresting to hear buzz words like “grass fed” or “free range”. We need to do better at getting our points across to those who are not already fully invested in these ideas without prompting the inevitable eye roll.
Maybe we let the taste of the meat do the talking for us. Those who have not been to a butcher shop before may be intimidated to do so, but Divone encourages the idea that once you dive in and try it, it changes your whole mindset on how you see food on a daily basis. This works on all levels of the community. He had a young woman come into the shop who said she really wanted to try Fleishers, but she's on a strict budget. The skilled butchers were able to direct her to a cut of meat that was flavorful and tender, but at a fraction of the cost of other more traditional cuts. She came back a week later full of gratitude and the realization that eating well can be accessible to her. Now she is someone who can pass this information on to friends and loved ones.
This is the lesson we hope to teach everyone we connect with. Just take the first step, ask the question, and know below the surface everyone has something to offer. Go visit Divone at the Westport location and be a sponge to the knowledge he offers.