Colorado’s Oldest Business Is a San Luis Grocery Store That Opened in 1857
Plenty of Colorado’s history lives in museums and ghost towns. But some of it is still open for business.
One San Luis general store has been serving customers since before Colorado was even a territory, and you can still walk in and buy groceries there today.
Keep scrolling to learn about the oldest continuously-running business in Colorado.
What is the Oldest Business in Colorado?
The R&R Market in San Luis, now called the San Luis Peoples Market, is known as the oldest continuously operating business in Colorado.
Dario Gallegos, one of the founders of San Luis, opened the store in May 1857 with $452. His descendants ran it for eight generations, more than 160 years in the same family.
The store sits in San Luis, the oldest town in Colorado, and it’s survived plenty to keep its title.
168 Years of Fires, Attacks and Renovations
It survived an attack in 1858, a fire in 1895, and another fire in the 1940s.
In 2022, the family sold the store to the Acequia Institute, a local nonprofit, which renamed it the San Luis Peoples Market.
When asbestos, lead paint, and mold turned up in the old adobe building, the market moved into an annex down the street and kept serving customers while crews renovated.
It reopened on Main Street in 2025, still the only full-service grocery store in town, and still the oldest business in Colorado.
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