Hannaford Opened: before 2007 Owner: Ahold Delhaize Previous Tenants: unknown Cooperative: none Location: 190 Kennedy Memorial Dr, Waterville, ME Photographed: August 12, 2019 Waterville has two Hannafords along with a Shaw's (and previously had a Save-A-Lot ). Both are around 45,000 square feet, and this one is on the southern end of town just down the street from the Shaw's. Unfortunately, I don't have much to report on the history of the store -- tracking down full history for a lot of these Maine stores has been tricky -- but I seem to remember Hannaford briefly owning a warehouse-style discount store, which I believe was under the name Sun Foods . This exterior bears some resemblance to those stores, so it's possible it was once a Sun Foods but I don't have confirmation of that. Tomorrow, we'll be headed about three miles west to tour an independent grocer in a nearby small town!
Save-A-Lot Open: 2012-2023 Owner: employee owned Previous Tenants: Ames Later Tenants: vacant Cooperative: none Location: 20 Concourse W, Waterville, ME Photographed: August 12, 2019 Save-A-Lot has had some well-publicized struggles in recent years, and part of the shift was switching all of the corporate-owned stores to independent franchise ownership. But beyond that, even some independently-owned stores have faced hard times, and that's been the case here in Waterville. A new, roughly 20,000 square foot Save-A-Lot opened downtown in 2012 in part of a former Ames department store, but closed a little over a decade later. This one was employee-owned by a local group that also runs Food City supermarkets in New England. I visited in 2019, and it was still looking fairly new despite the fact that it would close four years later. Produce was in the front-right corner with sale items in the rest of the first aisle. Meat and cold cuts were on the back wa...