The first Ingles store was opened by second-generation grocer Robert P. Ingle in 1963 and located in Asheville, North Carolina. Ingle had worked in his father's store since he was five years old and was unable to convince his father to build a large store. The younger Ingle had a vision of 4000 square feet. When Elmer Ingle died in the 1950s, Robert Ingle sold the store because his mother could not run it. Seven years later at age 29 Ingle decided to build a new 10,000-square-foot store. He would have to compete with larger chains and with independent stores that used cooperative distributors.
