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Washington DC Area Grocery Stores


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There's an interesting article in this morning's USA Today regarding the latest Whole Food's store in Austin, TX. There's a lot of emphasis being placed on the entertainment of food shopping. The article indicates that one of the new concept stores will be coming to Annapolis and that some of the entertainment elements may eventually be seen in current stores.

Whole Foods Article in USA Today

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I just hope that the Whole Foods that they are putting in near Old Town Alexandria has a meat case similar to the one on Wilson Blvd. in Arlington. I'm always impressed by the selection of sausages and veal that they have at that store.

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There's an interesting article in this morning's USA Today regarding the latest Whole Food's store in Austin, TX.  There's a lot of emphasis being placed on the entertainment of food shopping.  The article indicates that one of the new concept stores will be coming to Annapolis and that some of the entertainment elements may eventually be seen in current stores. 

Whole Foods Article in USA Today

What's not mentioned in the article is the presence of the flagship store of HEB's Central Market which is a virtual clone of the Wegmans in Sterling in many way.

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cjsadler:

Still haven't figured out the quote thing. Sigh.

No, the Harris Teeter thing isn't QUITE a done deal; but, after living in the neighborhood for 30 years (!), this seems to be one of those deals everybody wants. The usual suspects are worried about traffic and every effort will be made to (mostly) satisfy the closest neighbors.

The way new apartment buildings are going up around the Citadel, a new store in that location is really needed. And, don't forget, there used to be a very popular skating rink in there a long time ago. It seems that most of the ANC members want this, too. That counts for something and they aren't up for reelection until 2006. This is supposed to happen by then.

All in all, reason to be optimistic.

Edited by rosebud (log)
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There's an interesting article in this morning's USA Today regarding the latest Whole Food's store in Austin, TX.  There's a lot of emphasis being placed on the entertainment of food shopping.  The article indicates that one of the new concept stores will be coming to Annapolis and that some of the entertainment elements may eventually be seen in current stores. 

Whole Foods Article in USA Today

What's not mentioned in the article is the presence of the flagship store of HEB's Central Market which is a virtual clone of the Wegmans in Sterling in many way.

Joe - I thought that was a fairly significant oversight in the article as well. I hadn't realized that Whole Foods was based out of Austin too. I got to visit Central Market last summer and was amazed. I can't wait to try out the "entertainment" Whole Foods on my next visit.

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I believe Safeway actually refers to their 65-70,000 square foot market near Arundel Mills as a "concept" store. I also believe that the one under construction on Elden Street in Herndon (about the same size) is also one. I have not been in the Arundel Mills store so I really don't know what constitutes a future store for Safeway. But a 55-60,000 square foot Whole Foods could be seriously interesting. I'm guessing that the Whole Foods in Vienna is about 30,000 or so; therefore doubling this would create quite an attraction.

Still, I believe that the success of Wegmans more recent larger stores, the City Markets, maybe Byerly's in Minneapolis, several of the Larry's Markets in Seattle (I travel too much!!!!) and others are causing chains like Safeway and Harris Teeter as well as Balducci's and Whole Foods to take serious looks at some of their future stores. One of the few advantages of travel (after 24 years I'm really burnt out!) is that sharing the same interests with many on this board I have the advantage of stopping out of town to see what I may read about on here or elsewhere. There are also national trade publications which have extensive features and updates on the success of these.

I remember stopping at a Larry's Market east of Seattle 15 or 16 years ago and being blown away since at least 1/3 of it had a distinct marketplace kind of ambience. I hadn't seen this anywhere else, outside of say, the Lexington Market, Pike Place, etc. But I really liked it, even down to the boutique stands within the store. The market itself wasn't enormous (maybe 55,000-60,000 square feet) but the concept was really unique. A hybrid grocery store/city market/farmers' market ambience. I can't remember the first Whole Foods/Fresh Fields/Wild Oats that I was in but I really don't think any of them were more "interesting" than the Larry's. HEB then did not have their City Markets and Wegmans had large 110,000 square foot stores with their version of the marketplace/grocery store/food court mix but Larry's really seemed to have it down.

Since then Wegmans has evolved into what is probably the industry standard as represented in Sterling with City Market directly comparable. The Whole Foods in Vienna always appealed to me because it was a renovated 60-70 year old Southern States building with a relatively high ceiling. I have always really liked that particular Whole Foods. Anyway, coming full circle, now we have Safeway, Harris Teeter, maybe Publix in Florida and even Schnuck's in St. Louis with their versions of this, all somewhat smaller than the 130,000 square foot Wegmans.

I haven't been to the Larry's in Bellevue since that first visit. I wonder if now it seems small and outmoded by comparison. I also wonder if Larry's has a new concept store of their own.

The limit for all this seems to be the store that I mentioned in another thread, the 285,000 square foot Jungle Jim's in Middletown, OH which bills itself as "an amusement park for foodies of all ages." I was there before the current expansion and it was huge and interesting. Still, for me, then it was huge but not quite on par with City Market, Wegmans or an Auchan I was in overseas at Val d'Europa because of the overall ambience. This is the link to it:

http://www.chowhound.com/boards/general18/...ages/64210.html

Anyway, I've talked about some of this before so I apologize if I am redundant. Grocery stores have fascinated me for a long time-an alternative to bar hopping when travelling! I think we are particularly fortunate in the D. C. area since many of these concepts are being tested or introduced here.

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Back on the old Total Yogurt discussion from November/December 2004: I bought some Total with Greek honey recently from the Takoma Park Silver Spring Coop. I just ate it tonight. Good as ever. So I'm supposing it's more widely available again, and back on US shelves.

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Back on the old Total Yogurt discussion from November/December 2004: I bought some Total with Greek honey recently from the Takoma Park Silver Spring Coop. I just ate it tonight. Good as ever. So I'm supposing it's more widely available again, and back on US shelves.

How does this differ from, let's say, the honey yogurt that the Blue Ridge dude sells at Dupont. Just a drier form, more in a Greek style?

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I have two words to whisper into Mr. Safeway's ear:  Harris Teeter.  We are getting a new one in the old Citadel building on Kalorama Road.  I'm just hoping the competition will spur the Ghetto Safeway to clean up its act.

Sorry, can't help on the noodles.

Don't get your hopes up too much on HT being your savior. I frequent the one in Pentagon City...closest market to my home. Frankly, their produce sucks. UNLESS you hit it on the day they put it out there. But then you really need to use it quickly. I don't know where their suppliers come from, but I think it has lots of mileage on the truck before it hits the shelves.

I really think the best answer, for produce at least, is to find out when the deliveries come and work according to that. As far as I'm concerned, there's no discernible difference between produce from Safeway, Giant, HT, Shoppers, etc. The key is to make sure you get it on the day it arrives.

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How does this differ from, let's say, the honey yogurt that the Blue Ridge dude sells at Dupont.  Just a drier form, more in a Greek style?

I haven't tried that yogurt, so I can't respond to the differences between Total and the yogurt you mentioned. Total is a Greek-made strained yogurt--not a yogurt cheese, but thicker and richer than most domestic yogurt.

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  • 1 year later...
Trader Joe's coming to West End?

While browsing Craigslist looking at apartments, I've noticed a few recent advertisements that claim a Trader Joe's is "moving in next door" to a new condo building on 25th St. NW between M and Penn.

I'm not sure if this is the same location, but I've read Balducci's was considering a location in the Penn Quarter area. At first it was on, then they (Balducci's) said they wanted to hold off on expansion. Then DC added some more perks, aka tax incentives, so maybe it is back on? Though this could easily be somewhere else, as space needed for a Balducci's and Trader Joe's is quite different.

For those of us in the suburbs, something to look forward to in the next 3 years: Congressional Whole Foods moving South, near White Flint to a store double in size, and Wegmans opening in Landover and Crotfton.

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From what I understand, Balducci's scrapped those plans. The chain is expanding, but largely in the Northeast and going for wealthy communities in places like Connecticut. It seems to be suffering from a crisis of identity, but going more in the direction of the rather colorless Sutton Place Gourmet than what seems more promising to me: the OLD Balducci's with stellar produce and things Italian.

"Viciousness in the kitchen.

The potatoes hiss." --Sylvia Plath

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For those of us in the suburbs, something to look forward to in the next 3 years: Congressional Whole Foods moving South, near White Flint to a store double in size, and Wegmans opening in Landover and Crotfton.

And Balducci's moving into the Congressional WF space. I can't wait for that Whole Foods to close - it's about half the size it needs to be.

Heather Johnson

In Good Thyme

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