Alvaro Garcia Sr. came to the U.S. from Mexico when he was 16. He settled in New Jersey and started working several jobs to make a living. One of those jobs included helping his sister, who owned a grocery store in New Jersey. After his day job at the factory, he would come to help her stock the shelves at night. Then one day a friend told Alvaro that there was a growing Hispanic population in a small city in Upstate New York. Alvaro saw an opportunity and he decided to take a trip to Newburgh and found that there was a growing market, but no one was really doing anything to cater to them. 

In 1985 and with a loan from his sister, Alvaro decided buy out an existing 800 square foot grocery store that was going out of business and moved his family to Newburgh. Alvaro started to stock his shelves with hard to find Hispanic products at that time. At first it was very hard for the family to make a living and he was working anywhere from 18-20 hours a day. Soon word started to get out and customers came to Garcia's because of the availability of products that reminded them of their hometown and Alvaro started building a relationship with his customers. 

A few years later as his customer base was getting larger, he moved the business to a new location. This location was 1,800 square feet and eventually added a kitchen where tacos were sold and this, along with the grocery store started to prosper. This time he extended his offering to include items for the new growing South American population.

In 1998, Garcia's moved to a larger location in Middletown. This location is 7,000 square feet and allowed Garcia's to increase their offering to not just the Mexican community, but also those from Central, South America and the Caribbean.

Garcia’s has been catering to the local Hispanic community in Orange County since 1985 and has been here to serve the public. Part of our mission is to provide families with those memories that they grew up with and keeping the family traditions strong at the dinner table. We have always placed a great emphasis on what our customers’ needs are and getting that hard to find ingredient on our shelves for them to take home. Our commitment always has been and will continue to be to offer the best service to our customer.