Corner stores, once a common sight in Vancouver neighbourhoods, are fast disappearing. Yet the ones that remain are thriving as they adapt to changing communities.

A long-time Kits resident, I’ve shopped at Kits Food Market (1575 Yew Street) for years. Owners Laura and Lawrence Low (“Everybody calls him Ron,” says Laura) have operated the busy store, a family business, since 1976. Things like taking phone orders and delivering groceries to elderly customers; hiring a sweet, mentally challenged man to help out; and letting those caught short pay the rest of what we owe “next time” are part of what has endeared them to the community.

The store’s stock isn’t revolutionary, but it has everything one needs: fresh produce; Thai, Indian, and Chinese sauces; frozen meat; bread; soups; and ice cream, as well as basic drugstore items, candles, and mousetraps. The heart of the market is a side room where Laura expertly fashions eye-catching bouquets for overflowing sidewalk displays. And it’s where she creates gorgeous arrangements for corporate customers, plus many loyal regulars. The store has always carried flowers and plants (orchids vie for shelf space with groceries), but today the floral bouquets and arrangements are among the best—and best-priced—in the city.

Strathcona’s 32-year-old Union Food Market (810 Union Street) has been in the hands of the Bernardino family—Maria, Annibal, and son David—for 15 years since they took it over from another Portuguese family, the Gomeses. Shelves and fridges are stocked with an array of fresh produce, Portuguese olive oil, chorizo, bacalao (salted cod), and sardines. There are plenty of freshly made, ready-to-eat goodies, too, from chicken and pizza to Portuguese rice pudding. Maria’s corn bread is legendary. She bakes it, plus sweet corn bread, Portuguese buns, cinnamon buns, and pies, daily in the bakery at the back of the store, and supplies catering companies and delis as well. With a business degree and extensive travel under his belt, David has joined his parents in running the shop, and he hopes they’ll work less as he assumes more of the store’s operations. (They close only on Christmas, New Year’s Day, and Easter.) When I visited, it was Maria’s birthday. A constant stream of friends and regulars poured in with flowers, cake, and good wishes, with no sign of letting up.

Helen’s Grocery (2146 West 6th Avenue) is a riot of colour inside and out, and it’s so cheerful that smiles are automatic. Outside, old Coca-Cola signs compete with new Dan-D-Pak ads. Indoors, bright red, green, and yellow stripes ring walls. Dazzling lighting shows off multihued juice and pop bottles and neatly shelved snacks, making it clear what the ’hood is into. Look closer and you’ll find basic housewares, pet food, organic soymilk, and cool greeting cards. There are Chinese lanterns in the front window and a flat-screen TV tuned to Asian variety shows. The proprietor of Helen’s, Peter Wong, has helmed the shop for 10 years and figures the building has been around for about 110 years. But the identity of the person who started the store, and of Helen herself, remains a mystery.

Tucked into a 97-year-old building deep in the West End, Danial Foods (1500 Barclay Street) sports signage from a previous incarnation, the Barclay Grocery. A food lover’s haven, it’s well stocked with items like wheatgrass (a symbolic item for Persian New Year), fresh fruit and veggies, Persian spices like sumac and za’atar, figs, and baked goods, as well as bulk olives, nuts, lentils and beans, feta, and hummus. Owner Tony Shahroknian has eight years under his belt and is itching to expand next door so that he can add meat and more to his eclectic selection.

A friend tipped me off about a community-focused corner store in North Vancouver, Pemberton Heights Corner Store (1096 West 22nd Street), which fits its secluded neighbourhood—one of the region’s oldest—perfectly. The building, which dates back to the 1960s, sat empty for a year before business partners Len Hazelton and Tracey Cochrane bought it last May and moved their families in upstairs. The pair wanted to continue operating a corner store but didn’t want to sell the usual cigarettes, lottery tickets, and candy. Unable to compete with nearby big-box stores, they decided to focus on well-priced healthy, organic, specialty groceries (Mexican blue-agave sweetener, anyone?) tailored to the ’hood, and locally made, natural cleaning products. A gift section is loaded with handicrafts made by Pemberton Heights’ residents, and neighbourhood teens staff the shop. There’s a coffee bar, too, and when asked about a recent latte delivery to an ailing customer, Hazelton said, “We do that all the time.” Just try asking for that at a big-box store.