Northern Bay Market - Penobscot, ME

Northern Bay Market
Opened: 1985

Owner: Jamie MacNair

Previous Tenants: unknown

Cooperative: none

Location: 177 Southern Bay Rd, Penobscot, ME

Photographed: June 11, 2022 and June 13, 2022

Despite the fact that we're starting to get pretty far north -- Penobscot is farther north than some parts of Canada, such as Toronto, and it's less than 100 miles from the Maine border with Canada -- this still isn't the extremely remote parts of Maine. We're only about 25 miles from Bangor here in Penobscot, a very small town where the Bagaduce River meets the Northern Bay on the Blue Hill Peninsula. The only grocer in town, though, is a small general store (and gas station) called the Northern Bay Market.

Like T&C Market, some seriously old-school gas pumps here!

Between the Keep Smiling chalkboard and the seafood one, yes, we're definitely in small-town New England!

The Northern Bay Market has been open under its current ownership since 1985, but it's abundantly clear (from the outside and inside) that this store long predates the 1980s.

There's some groceries up front along with a liquor store, and packaged refrigerated foods (plus beer) in the back. Smaller and a bit more limited than some of the other general stores we've seen, but that's only logical with this store's very small 2000 square foot footprint.

The town of Blue Hill is about six and a half miles southeast of here, also on the Blue Hill Peninsula (naturally), and that's a larger town -- 3000 people as opposed to the 1000 here in Penobscot, so neither is that big. But Blue Hill has two supermarkets plus one smaller grocer that recently closed, and we're going to see all three right here on The Market Report over the next couple days!