With its tightly packed bungalows and buzzing commercial strips, Manhattan Beach has a much more approachable feel than many similarly wealthy areas in Los Angeles. After a bit of exploration, visitors get the sense that residents here are less interested in Hollywood hijinks than with getting to the beach or the airport without driving on the L.A. freeway.

So what better place for a veteran grower and exporter to open an otherwise unassuming little store stocked with fruits and vegetables screened for unsurpassed quality?

Born into a family that has been growing citrus in California's Central Valley for more than 65 years, Barry Fisher began his own produce exporting business in the early 1990s. Working predominantly with importers in Asia, he now ships products ranging from stone fruits, cherries and grapes, to onions, asparagus, potatoes and lettuce overseas.

With long-distance shipping, superior quality is a paramount consideration, but Fisher said that somewhere between all of the time spent inspecting farms and screening product, something started to disappoint him.

“One thing that had always surprised me was the lack of quality in the L.A. market, compared to what I was seeing when I was buying produce [directly] from growers and bringing that stuff home,” he explained. “Los Angeles is so close to all of the major growing regions, but I don't think the average retail quality of produce in this market reflects that. And, basically, I would pass out fruits I had brought home to our neighbors and friends — our son even had a cherry stand out in front of our house — people were really surprised at the quality that a grower could put out.”

And so his first retail venture — Grow: The Produce Shop — was launched a little more than a year ago. Housed in a small, nondescript strip-mall, the location is tiny by supermarket standards — a mere 1,700 square feet of selling space.

It certainly doesn't lack competition, either. Just a few blocks down Sepulveda Boulevard, a large Ralphs looms, and within a short drive of the store, shoppers have options including Vons, Bristol Farms, Whole Foods and Trader Joe's.

But with much of the store's produce hand-selected by Fisher or the growers that work with his export business, the level of quality and consistency is truly exceptional.

“He's a great customer, because he actually looks at the fruit when it comes in from the field, and he looks at the job we do in the shed,” noted Greg Costa, a cherry grower with Lodi, Calif.-based Felix Costa & Sons who has worked with Fisher for almost a decade. “He spends a lot of time in the orchards.”