After 2 generations, new owner set to take over The Hoagie Shop in North Apollo

The second-generation family owners of The Hoagie Shop in North Apollo might be retiring, but not their famous cold, 12-inch Italian hoagie that still sells for under $5.

It’s been a 60-year run for two generations of the Toland family, which has been serving up its signature hoagies with fresh buns and made-from-scratch, super-secret seasoning mixes and sauces.

“My husband’s family is proud of what they did with the business,” said Gaylene Toland of North Apollo. “It is just time to retire.”

The new owner, Jamie Hrobak, will take over the shop along 18th Street on Jan. 3.

Plans are to keep the the hoagies the same, Toland said.

The old-fashioned hoagie shop does not have a website or a Facebook page.

It doesn’t need them.

The shop doesn’t accept credit cards, either. Cash only.

“We’re so busy,” Toland said. “We can’t take credit cards because it would take too long to process.”

Jeaniva Toland bought The Hoagie Shop in 1960 in Vandergrift when it was known as Miller’s Hoagie Shop. Miller’s still has shops in Kittanning, Ford City and Butler. About two years after Toland bought the shop, she moved it to Apollo, then North Apollo.

The matriarch shortened the name to The Hoagie Shop, Toland said.

Lack of change seems to have worked out well.

“We have done nothing differently,” Toland said. “The government still knows us as Miller’s Hoagie Shop, and we have people come here regularly from Lower Burrell, New Kensington and Tarentum.”

Actually, the North Apollo hoagie shop attracts customers from all over the United States.

“They are people who grew up here and who moved away,” Toland said. “But when they come back, they come to the hoagie shop and then see their parents,” Toland said.

Just last week, customers who walked through the door live in Las Vegas, Florida and Seattle. One of those visitors wanted to know if she could take one of the hoagies with her to see her son in Guam. Nice thought, Toland said. But no, the hoagie didn’t make the trip.

The shop’s hoagies are dependable, too. They continue to serve up their apparently special tuna salad hoagies Tuesdays and Fridays.

Toland attributes the shop’s loyal following to the quality of the hoagie — with a special dry season mix — and low price.

“We have a different taste,” Toland said. “We mix our own seasoning. People enjoy just coming in and talking.”

Wendy Minik, 68, North Apollo has been going to the hoagie shop since the late 1960s when it was in Apollo and keeps coming because “they are always the same.”

The buns are soft. The meat is cut nicely. “It’s just delicious.”

When Minik attended Apollo High School in the late 1960s, she remembers there was an open lunch period when students could go into town for lunch.

“They made a beeline so they could get in the line at The Hoagie Shop,” Minik said.

At one time, the hoagies were so popular one was put in the open casket during the funeral home visitation of a longtime patron, Minik said.

She credits the Toland family for keeping the prices down.

“They wanted to feed families of people,” Minik said. “They never got greedy. They really served our community.”