Town Talk Is The Talk Of Fort Worth

Saturday I got email from Fort Worth's #1 Conservationist, who I will refer to as Anonymous, because I don't know if Anonymous wants to be known as the source of this particular piece of information.

Anonymous asked if I had been to the Town Talk store on Beach Street. I had not. It is a surplus food store. Food and a lot of other stuff, I learned about an hour ago.

I've long noticed the Town Talk building, it's at the northwest corner of the Beach Street, Randol Mill Road intersection, a short distance north of I-30.

As you can see in the picture, Town Talk is in a metal shed building. It's very barebones, perfectly fitting for a surplus store. Anonymous told me that going to Town Talk is sort of a thrill of the hunt type deal. The stock changes all day long, so you never know when, or if, some good thing gets put on the shelves or in the freezer.

There were quite a few cars in the parking lot, parked in a sort of helter skelter randomness, which I soon was to see perfectly fit Town Talk. There were a large number of people inside, pushing carts that were stuffed with a lot of stuff. I did not push a cart. I just walked around, up and down the aisles.

The frozen food was interesting. Some of it seemed to have come from restaurants. There were several large containers, filled with something brown, on which the label said "Conch Chowder". Some of the frozen stuff was off the frozen fish stick, chicken parts, pizza, ice cream sort. There were also frozen turkeys, pork loins, steaks, tilipia and other seafoods and meats.

I saw Folgers coffee costing more than it does at Wal-Mart. Same with salad dressing. There was pretty much an entire aisle devoted to spices. Very good bargains and good quality brand names in that section.

There is a lot of non-food stuff in Town Talk, like detergent and soap and all sorts of paper plate, cup type products.

A couple months ago I read "When Giants Fall". All about the coming collapse of America, which, according to the author, is well underway. It was published before last fall's economic meltdown, which the author predicted, among other things, like we Americans are going to have to learn how to scrounge and be scavengers, looking for bargains, settling for a lesser standard of living.

Even though Town Talk has been open for over a half a century, I think it's now being cutting edge, with the vanguard of America's new, ever growing, scavenger class, making do, in this new economy, with Town Talk helping with the process.

I did not buy anything. I had no cash. It did not look like they took debit cards. There were a couple things I would have bought, a spice or two, some organic pea soup and a pork loin. But, I'd already done some scavenging today at Sprouts Farmers Market in Southlake, so I'm well-stocked with goods. For now.