G's Stores
123 Northdown Road
A kosher butcher and deli at the heart of community life.
Researched and Written by Katie Blythe
1994 Benny Gradus death announcement
G’s Stores​
For decades, the pale blue frontage of G’s Stores at 123 Northdown Road was a landmark of Jewish Cliftonville. Recalled with affection locally, the delicatessen and kosher butcher was more than just a grocery store. The shop was a “balagan”, stuffed with warmth, noise, and bursting with the smells of smoked fish, pickled cucumbers, and freshly baked cheesecake.
Benny was the boss - confident and considerate, a father-like figure. He was always busy, slicing smoked salmon with a long, sharp knife or cutting cheesecake from a slab.​
Wayne Stock, employee 1974-75
Benny The Boss & Sadie The Schmoozer
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The shop was run by Benny and Sadie Gradus, who became much-loved in Cliftonville’s Jewish population. Both were born in 1908 and married in London in 1935. They arrived in Cliftonville in the mid-Fifties and soon became the backbone of local Jewish life. Former employee Wayne Stock, who worked at G’s in the mid-1970s, remembered Benny as “the boss”, confident and considerate, a father-like figure who was always busy behind the counter, slicing smoked salmon with a long, sharp knife or cutting cheesecake from a slab. A devout man who had begun working at 13 after the death of his father, Benny brought to the seaside town the skills of a London fishmonger and the commitment of a lifelong community organiser. His reputation for slicing smoked salmon with near surgical precision was matched only by Sadie’s talent for “schmoozing”, making every visitor feel known and welcome.
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Sadie was remembered as something of a local legend. Perrina Hoser, a former member of the Margate Jewish congregation, recalled that if Sadie thought a cake was not fresh enough, she would insist on replacing it and would not allow the customer to pay. Perrina also remembered Benny and Sadie as people who “kept that community alive with food and laughter”, creating a space that felt as emotionally generous as it was halachically necessary.​
Sadie Gradus – she was like a legend. If she told you your cake wasn’t fresh, she’d give you another one and wouldn’t let you pay. They kept that community alive with food and laughter.​
Perrina Hoser,
former member of the Margate Jewish community​
The shop was run by Benny and Sadie Gradus, who became much-loved in Cliftonville’s Jewish community. Both were born in 1908 and married in London in 1935. They arrived in Cliftonville in the mid-Fifties and soon became the backbone of local Jewish life. Former employee Wayne Stock, who worked at G’s in the mid-1970s, remembered Benny as “the boss”, confident and considerate, a father-like figure who was always busy behind the counter, slicing smoked salmon with a long, sharp knife or cutting cheesecake from a slab. A devout man who had begun working at 13 after the death of his father, Benny brought to the seaside town the skills of a London fishmonger and the commitment of a lifelong community organiser. His reputation for slicing smoked salmon with near surgical precision was matched only by Sadie’s ability to make every visitor feel known and welcome.
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Sadie was remembered as something of a legend within the community. Perrina Hoser, a former member of the Margate Jewish community, recalled that if Sadie thought a cake was not fresh enough, she would insist on replacing it and would not allow the customer to pay. Perrina also remembered Benny and Sadie as people who “kept that community alive with food and laughter”, creating a space that felt as generous as it was essential.
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Their children, Geoffrey, Allan, Stanley, and David, helped behind the counter, with Geoffrey, a trained chef, returning from London to manage the butchery when Benny fell ill, keeping the shop going for another 30 years. He often worked extraordinarily long hours, especially during the height of the summer season, and continued to care for Benny and Sadie long after the shop was sold. His wife, Gerrie, worked behind the counter and was equally integral to the running of the shop, later recalling that despite their exhaustion, the shop’s rhythm soon became inseparable from their own. Their daughter, Ruth, remembered that this partnership, forged in the daily demands of G’s Stores, reflected that same devotion that shaped their marriage for nearly 70 years. The family’s service extended beyond business: Benny served as President of the Margate Hebrew Congregation for over 25 years and was described in his 1994 obituary as “a pillar of the community.”
Behind the Deli Counter​
Those who worked at G’s remember its order and energy. Beneath the sales floor was a vast cellar used for stock; above it, storerooms and a huge freezer for meat and cheese. The shop opened on Sundays, closing instead for Shabbat, an arrangement that made it both distinct and indispensable. It was, in the words of one customer, “the only shop shut on Saturdays but the only one open on Sundays” on Northdown Road.
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Wayne Stock remembered a workplace full of camaraderie and bustle. Staff included Geoffrey’s jovial butchery partner, Sid, who entertained customers with mock pratfalls, and Jim, an older worker whose copperplate handwriting adorned every delivery note. Others recalled Meshugana Morris, a comic fixture of the shop, and Derrick, who handled poultry when Rev. Reverend Bernard Landau came weekly to perform shechita, or ritual slaughter. Wages were handed out in small brown envelopes, and during the 1974 bread strike, the shop became a minor miracle: the only place in town that still had bread.
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Even customers who weren’t Jewish were drawn to the life and warmth of the Graduses’ shop. Many remembered being fascinated by its variety of foods and by Sadie’s friendly guidance. Children of local shopkeepers across the road recalled how she affectionately addressed them as “young Mr” or “Miss”, teaching them about unfamiliar Jewish foods like matzos or challah bread.
Sadie was known for her creativity and thrift. She would buy second-hand clothes and fashion them into little peg bags, which she would sell to tourists along with their groceries.
1971 advert for G's Stores
c.1970s - G's Stores on Northdown Road
Smoked, Salted, & Sliced​
If G’s Stores had a signature, it was its scent: the mingling of smoked salmon, pickled cucumbers, yeast, and cake. For many, this smell defined Jewish Cliftonville as powerfully as the synagogue itself. The shop’s offerings ranged from salt beef and rollmops to poppy-seed bread rolls, cheesecakes, bagels, doughnuts, and soft apple strudels supplied by local kosher baker Joe Klein. Customers came for challah loaves on Sundays, for onion fritter mix, and for the famously thin-sliced smoked salmon that graced countless Shabbat tables. Some still remember the taste of cream cheese or free-range chicken: luxuries at the time, reserved for holidays and celebrations. Other grocery items were sourced from London, with Benny Gradus driving a van to the East End to bulk-buy from kosher wholesalers, like Blooms, until his van was filled to the brim.​
The shop’s interior was remembered as both chaotic and homely, filled with chatter, laughter, and the loud, steady hum of Yiddish voices. Children would press their noses to the cake trays, while parents exchanged communal gossip. Even the mishaps became folklore: from the customer’s dog that drank pickle brine from a barrel on the floor, to the time the shop was broken into through a skylight, with the burglar landing squarely in a cheesecake, leaving a tell-tale footprint behind.
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To many residents, G’s was central to the area’s spiritual life. People came not only to buy food but to catch up with neighbours, share stories, and absorb the comfort of familiarity. The shop’s rhythms followed the Jewish calendar: before Yom Tov or Pesach, the counters were packed; before Shabbat, the chatter reached a joyful crescendo. It was a place where belonging was bought by the slice and carried home in brown paper bags.
Last Orders​
By the 1980s, the changing social landscape of Cliftonville was transforming its Jewish congregation. Kosher hotels closed, younger families moved away, and supermarkets drew trade from independent shops. G’s struggled to compete, finally closing in 1987. For the Graduses, it was both a relief and a heartbreak; the end of an era that had sustained their family and the local Jewish population for nearly half a century.
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When Benny Gradus passed away seven years later, over 200 people attended his funeral. His obituary described him as a man loved by people of all faiths. For those who had grown up in Cliftonville, his passing and the closure of G’s Stores marked the symbolic end of Jewish Margate as they had known it.
The Frontage on Northdown Road​
Today, the building that once housed G’s is home to an antique shop, but for former residents, it remains a living landmark. The smell of brine and cake, the sound of Sadie’s laughter, and the bustle before Shabbat survive in collective memory. The Gradus family’s legacy also continued long after the shop closed. David Gradus passed away in 2020, an event that led to the sale of the Margate Hebrew Congregation synagogue building, marking the close of another chapter in Kentish Jewish history.
Geoffrey died in December 2025, with his wife Gerrie following him just two days later, reflecting a partnership that shaped their marriage and their years behind the counter at G’s Stores. To those who remember it, G’s Stores was not just a business. It smelt of home, sounded like belonging, and tasted like an identity that thrived on food and friendship.
G's Stores on Northdown Road. c. 1980
© Katie Blythe 2026
Primary Sources & Further Reading​​​
Cliftonville Nostalgia (2023–2024), Facebook Group, public community posts and recollections relating to G’s Stores.
Gaffin, Jean (2022), oral history interview. Cliftonville Voices Oral History Project. Unpublished interview recording and transcript.
Gradus, Ruth (2025), correspondence with author and funeral speech for Geoffrey and Gerrie Gradus.
Isle of Thanet Gazette (1994), “Leading Jew Benny Dies”, 17 June, p. 12.
Hoser, Perrina (2022), oral history interview. Cliftonville Voices Oral History Project. Unpublished interview recording and transcript.
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Hoser, Tania (2022), oral history interview. Cliftonville Voices Oral History Project. Unpublished interview recording and transcript.
Ruback, Ernestine (2021), oral history interview. Jewish History Thanet Project.
Ruback, Ernestine (2022), oral history interview. Cliftonville Voices Oral History Project. Unpublished interview recordings and transcripts.
Schwartzman, Arnold (2022), oral history interview. Cliftonville Voices Oral History Project. Unpublished interview recording and transcript.
Stock, Wayne (2024), personal recollections of employment at G’s Stores, 1974–1975. Written testimony and correspondence with Katie Blythe.