DEARBORN – Papaya Fruit Market held the ribbon cutting ceremony for its sixth store in West Dearborn on Thursday, with local officials and community leaders in attendance, including U.S. Reps Rashida Tlaib (D-Detroit) and Debbie Dingell (D- Ann Arbor), Wayne County Executive Warren Evans, Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud, Dearborn City Council President Mike Sareini, Councilmen Bob Abraham, Kamal Alsawafy and Mustapha Hammoud, Dearborn Board of Education Trustee Patrick D’Ambrosio and Melanie Brown from the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC).

Located at 22521 Michigan Avenue, the new store is the first Middle Eastern supermarket in West Dearborn, home to a growing Arab American community. Like its five other branches in Dearborn, Dearborn Heights, Detroit and Canton, the store offers fresh produce, halal beef and chicken, a bakery, a kitchen, groceries and imported foods from Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey and Egypt as well as India and Indonesia.

Before the ribbon-cutting, speakers praised Papaya’s longstanding popularity and its ability to earn the trust of a diverse customer base in Metro Detroit, fueling the chain’s growth since its first store opened in 2002. Founder and Arab American businessman Khalil Saad launched the business just four years after immigrating to the U.S. in 1998.

Tlaib highlighted the store’s reputation in the local economy, saying Papaya Fruit Market has distinguished itself through the quality and variety of its products, customer service and community engagement and contribution. She presented Saad with a Congressional certificate of recognition, adding that her mother is “a big fan of Papaya Fruit Markets.”

Evans also praised Saad’s success, noting that he had managed to open and operate six stores in 23 years across Metro Detroit. Evans joked that he, too, was “a big fan of Papaya, just like Rashida Tlaib’s mother.”

Mayor Hammoud pointed to the opportunities Dearborn provides for entrepreneurs, praising Arab-owned businesses like Papaya Fruit Market for drawing shoppers to the city. He recalled that his father, a Lebanese immigrant, once ran a small store in the 1980s.

“That store has long been closed, so we’re not competitors,” he joked with Saad.

Osama Siblani, publisher of The Arab American News, commended Papaya’s staff across all six locations and the leadership of Ibrahim Saad, Khalil Saad’s son, noting the store’s tradition of Wednesday discounts to support low-income families.

In an interview with The Arab American News, Khalil Saad explained that Papaya Fruit Markets stands apart by offering unique and exclusive items unavailable elsewhere in Michigan, stressing that the chain’s expansion reflects a commitment to serving the growing Arab American community with top-quality goods at fair prices.

In addition to the Papaya chain, Saad owns a wholesale company, Saad Trading, which operates two warehouses in Michigan and supplies goods nationwide.

Saad emphasized the importance of giving back.

“There are always people in need, and it’s very important to me to extend a helping hand to the poor and the vulnerable,” he said.

He noted that his philanthropic efforts extend beyond the local community.