The scene would usually be a strange sight at a greengrocer in Adelaide’s northeastern suburbs, but for Mr Kapiris it has become a near-daily occurrence.

“Even when we go interstate, it’s amazing how many people go ‘Oh my God, you’re that fruit and veg guy’,” Mr Kapiris said.

Mr Kapiris, who has run the Rostrevor store alongside his wife Leannda for 13 years, made headlines earlier this week for a viral rant unleashing on supermarket chains for “jacking up their f****** prices”.

In the video he attacked bigger retailers, saying “greedy corporations refuse to reduce the mark-up they make across all their lines of fruit and vegetables”.

It has been viewed more than 700,000 times and even sparked calls from online fans for the 45-year-old to run for prime minister.

But the fourth-generation Greek-Australian businessman is no stranger to social media fame.

The polarising figure has gone viral for calling out supermarket chain Aldi, his notorious “dropped pants specials” – for which he says he removes his trousers, but not his underwear – and even a feature with Adelaide’s own ‘Didgeridoo Man’ Kym Abrook, who confronted a home invader with the instrument.

Mr Kapiris’s larger-than-life personality couldn’t seem further from the humble walls of St Bernard’s, where the smell of freshly-baked pizza and the buzz of customers from all walks of life are a mainstay.

Inside Mr Kapiris’s office, one wall is plastered with Aldi stickers spelling out his notorious catchphrase, “f*** Aldi”, while the other is adorned with photos of his and Leannda’s three children – Kosta, 21, Annastacia, 19, and Alexander, 15.

Next to the desk is his infamous samurai sword – a prop which led to him being cautioned by police when he swung it around in a stunt at Aldi’s Norwood store in December last year.

Fruit and veg is in Mr Kapiris’ blood. His grandfather, John Kapiris, migrated to Australia from Greece in 1948 and bought a farm in Two Wells in the early ’50s.

“He was getting hammered by the merchants in Melbourne so he said ‘You know what, I’m gonna go and sell my tomatoes in the growers’ shed in Melbourne’,” Mr Kapiris said.

“To this day, 70 years later, we’re still growing in Two Wells and we’ve still got the wholesale business.”

Ironically, for a business now synonymous with social media fame, Mr Kapiris said his online presence only took off because he was “s*** on the phone”.

“I was basically too lazy to type in all the specials on Facebook,” he said.

“After the second or third post I said ‘I’m gonna walk around the shop and tell them the specials (on camera) and then I can show them the quality they’re gonna get there.”

“Then they started getting a little bit crazy. I speak the truth. I love to be honest and I’m not gonna bullshit to you – unless I f***** up.”

In 2019, Mr Kapiris had his first brush with viral fame – a campaign titled “F*** Aldi’, after the supermarket chain opened a store nearby.

“That’s what took my social media to the next level. It went ba-boom,” Mr Kapiris said.

“Every street corner there’s a f****** supermarket. In a shopping mall there are two, three, four supermarket chains in there.

“What that’s telling me is the government wants to fizzle out the small businesses – and we’re the backbone of this country, we have been since day one.

“Customers can come here and ask ‘What’s your best potato for chips? What’s your best potato for gnocchi? What variety is that tomato?’ and I’ll tell them straight away.”

But with profane social media success comes controversy, which Mr Kapiris acknowledges he has often found himself embroiled in.

In 2020, at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, a video of a worker coughing on a delivery driver was criticised as racist.

Mr Kapiris said he “didn’t hear” a comment at the end of the video, in which a worker says “Get a bit of Wuhan up ya”.

“If I’d heard that I wouldn’t have posted it. They were all friends – I think everything’s f****** hilarious … but I’m much more savvy now of what I post,” Mr Kapiris said.

Mrs Kapiris added: “I told John ‘Be careful what you put on there’. I don’t think he realises just how big these videos are going to get.”

It’s clear the couple, who have been married for 23 years, are yin and yang to each other.

“All publicity is good publicity, but the only reason it bothers me and brings me down is Leannda, seeing her down and upset,” Mr Kapiris said.

Mrs Kapiris said: “At the end of the day you’ve got to take the good with the bad. Whatever he does and goes through, it is what it is. It’s not going to upset our family life.”

While Mr Kapiris says criticism from “Karens” is usually water off a duck’s back, he admits an incident earlier this year, in which he and his son Alexander were pepper sprayed by police, left him rethinking his online presence.

The 45-year-old was charged with disorderly behaviour and hindering police. Mr Kapiris would not comment on the matter directly, but had previously said the incident – where police were called after reports of inappropriate behaviour – was a complete mix-up over him staging photos for a dropped-pants special in which he kept his underwear on.

“After that, I got Covid, I had long Covid, I was mentally drained, I was physically drained, and everything fell over. I didn’t even want to come to work,” Mr Kapiris said.

“It took me about three months to get back on social media.”

But Mrs Kapiris, who Mr Kapiris described as “the brains of the operation”, said behind the social media stunts was a man driven by an immense passion for his community.

“If we have a customer that passes away (Johnny) donates all the food for their funeral,” she said.

“But we don’t put that on social media because it comes from the heart.”

Recently, Mr Kapiris offered to donate produce for students at Norwood International High after hearing of children going without lunch during the school day.

He will also soon install a fridge filled with lunches for local students in need to come and collect.

“I said to Lynn the kitchen hand ‘Are you giving it to the kids that need it? Then you tell me whatever you want and I’m going to give it to you’,” Mr Kapiris said.

“I’m going to make 10, 20, 30, 50, 500 sandwiches a day. I don’t care if I have to make one or 1000 … I don’t want kids who might feel ashamed otherwise to be hungry.”

While Mr Kapiris’s dream is for St Bernard’s to expand interstate, he also wants Mrs Kapiris to one day pursue her passion – fashion design.

In the meantime, the couple reassured their beloved customers and community that St Bernard’s, and its videos, were here to stay.

“We’re tired, man. But when I see the shop flourishing like this, I get another three or four years in me,” Mr Kapiris said.

“We’ll be here for a while.”