Pioneering Hyde Park Health Food Store Bonne Sante Will Be Replaced By Chick-Fil-A, Owner Says (2025)

HYDE PARK — A Hyde Park health-food store that has served the neighborhood since the early ’70s is closing soon to make way for a Chick-Fil-A, its owner confirmed this week.

Bonne Sante Health Foods, 1512 E. 53rd St. in Hyde Park, is preparing to close after a half-century in business, ownerKristofer Braaten said Monday.

A 10-day “retirement sale” begins Saturday, with all items available at a 25-percent discount, Braaten said. “We’re obviously hoping to move as much product as we can out of the store” before the shop is renovated for a new Chick-Fil-A location, he said.

“We have so many customers that have been so loyal to the business, and loyal to what we were trying to accomplish: bringing alternative healing to people, and trying to do it in an affordable way, knowing the health care system is broken in this country,” he said.

Representatives for Chick-Fil-A were not available Monday to confirm plans for a Hyde Park location, company spokesperson Tricia Sylvia said. Renovations are likely to begin in March, and the restaurant will likely be open by late summer, said Braaten, who owns the building.

Braaten’s mother, LaVonne, founded Bonne Sante in 1972 near 53rd Street and Harper Avenue, kitty-corner to the current location.

Health-food stores at the time were “small, interesting places to buy wheat germ, bran and alternative, healthy items” — without a big brand to represent the concept, like Whole Foods does today, Braaten said.

“My mother was a pioneer — not only as a woman starting abusiness in those years … but on top of that, starting a health food store, which was pretty much unknown,” he said.

Pioneering Hyde Park Health Food Store Bonne Sante Will Be Replaced By Chick-Fil-A, Owner Says (1)

Braaten bought Bonne Sante from his mother in 1992, and purchased its current location in 2000, he said.

Over the years, the store expanded to offer vitamin and herbal supplements, a juice bar and café, while remaining “pretty true to the cause” ofselling goods without artificial additives or high levels of processing, Braaten said.

“Finding ways for people to say healthy, that was our goal, [to] accomplish that,” he said. “I know we have, because so many people have told us that personally [amid] their battles with diseases and ailments. I will be sad to not see those faces for sure.”

Braaten will remain the building’s landlord once Chick-Fil-A moves in, he said. He also owns Chicago Health Foods, 22 W. Maple St. on the Near North Side, which will stay open.

Hyde Park residents and sisters Kenya and Kacia Muhammad visited Bonne Sante Monday as they shopped for sage and vitamins, and weren’t aware the store was soon to close. Kenya is an “occasional” patron of the shop, while Kacia was making her first visit, they said.

“I’m just really shocked to hear the replacement is Chick-Fil-A,” Kenya Muhammad said. “I feel like this is such a needed store. It’s super vital, especially in a time now where our food is a bit more corrupt.

“I would just like to let the owner and the managers know that we love it here. It’s so beneficial and healing, really, to come to a place where you know they’re going to have what you need. It’s clean, it’s safe and it’s always a good vibe.”

Pioneering Hyde Park Health Food Store Bonne Sante Will Be Replaced By Chick-Fil-A, Owner Says (2)

Store operator Eunice Sanders intends to open her own store in Bronzeville under the name Sankofa Bonne Sante, a name that combines the old shop’s French translation of “good health” with a Twi phrase meaning “go back and get it,” she said.

The new store “will be a Black-owned and -operated store with the same great services we’ve been providing,” Sanders said. She has worked at Bonne Sante for six years and managed it for three, after taking over for longtime manager Don Hannah.

Braaten hasn’t yet discussed with Sanders whether he’ll allow her store to maintain the Bonne Sante name, he said. Braaten will not be involved with the Bronzeville shop, though he will donate shelving and other infrastructure Bonne Sante no longer needs, he said.

Pioneering Hyde Park Health Food Store Bonne Sante Will Be Replaced By Chick-Fil-A, Owner Says (3)

Sanders said her store will be on Indiana Avenue, though she declined to share the address until she’s officially purchased the property. Several Bonne Sante employees will be hired on at the Bronzeville store, she and Braaten said.

A juice bar and local vendors from Bonne Sante — including Sanders’ own Youness brand — will be available in Bronzeville alongside “healthy grill” meal options, she said.

The new shop will also offer a “wellness box” subscription and delivery services, as well as a “holistic healing” series this summer where kids can learn how to make candles and other products, Sanders said.

“I want to take my expertise and pass it on to the next generation,” Sanders said. “I don’t feel we can complain about the next generation if we do not give them the tools to succeed. One of those tools is the power of entrepreneurship, and to use their creative gifts.”

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Pioneering Hyde Park Health Food Store Bonne Sante Will Be Replaced By Chick-Fil-A, Owner Says (2025)

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