Our Beginnings

The roots of Jordan's General Store

It was my Grandfather's fault. He started the first Jordan family business in the 1950's. Bill Jordan had a grade 8 formal education but never stopped learning.

The first time I went to College it was for Hotel & Resort Management. After graduation I took a job as a night baker in a fly-in fly-out camp in Northern Alberta. Now that is a sure-fire way to have 300 men worship the ground you walk on! It was during a bit of downtime after 30 years of shift work in the First Responder Industry that it all came together for me.

I always knew I was going to have my own business but was just not sure what. I wanted to honour my roots with a superior small batch product.

My first job was working for my Uncle & Aunt at their General Store in Avening, Ontario. I would stock shelves, cut chunks of cheese on the big wooden butchers block, slice off individual slices of cold meats and wrap it in butcher paper and string for the customer.  Jordan + Avening General Store = Jordan's General Store Ltd.

Listed below are links to about a dozen of our Jordan family business. They are located in both Alberta and Ontario. Literally from "soup to nuts" in this family!

William James Jordan was a gunsmith
and started our first family business
"Jordan's Pistol & Gun Club" which flourished until the time of his death in October 1978.

This picture is of Bill and Kate Jordan
in their farmhouse kitchen with daughter Joyce in 1963.

Avening General Store as it stands today.
(photo credit Alan Thompson)