Just shy of half a mile from yesterday's
ShopRite is this Western Beef, which opened as a Waldbaum's. Around 2005, when Waldbaum's closed, Western Beef moved into the 52,000 square foot space from its
older location to the west on Forest Avenue. Today, that property now holds a
Harbor Freight Tools.
Western Beef's entrance is at the far left end of the storefront, leading shoppers into a spacious produce department. (This store has to be one of the largest Western Beef locations out there.) Deli is in an island that runs along the right side of the produce aisle, with seafood at the back of the first aisle and meat in a walk-in cooler along the back wall. Frozen is in the second-to-last aisle with dairy in the last aisle and bakery in the back corner.
Oh yeah, something about this store -- it's one of the brightest supermarkets I've ever been in. I returned to the store a while after photographing it to do some shopping at night, and it's positively blinding inside. Anyway, despite that, it's a very pleasant store. Spacious, clean, and well-stocked across the board. I don't have a Western Beef near me but I love their prices when I can get there.
Weekly sales, customer service, and registers along the front-end. Very little inside remains from Waldbaum's, as Western Beef pretty much cleared out the space to outfit it the way their stores typically look.
Deli with the charmingly creepy cartoon characters above it in an island facing produce. I doubt Waldbaum's had any island here, and the deli was probably on a perimeter wall.
Western Beef relies on volume sales in the produce and meat departments as the backbone of the business. You wouldn't know it because it was summer time, but my visit was pretty late in the evening, hence the empty store. You would never see this any other time.
Seafood in the back corner, which is run by an outside vendor (Seabreeze Fish Market).
Along the back wall, we see bulk items and sales on the wall with the walk-in refrigerator room butcher shop on the other side of the wall.
There are two entrances to the butcher room, one next to seafood (first picture) and one next to bakery (second picture). Let's head in...
Western Beef takes its meat department seriously. The room is kept between 35 and 40 degrees, with meat displayed out on shelves. There's also a service butcher area at the back.
And they're big on value-priced meat, but I rarely buy meat, so I can't accurately speak to how their meat prices compare.
The famous brick oven bakery at the back of the store! As I said, I was here at night, so it was mostly sold out, but man do they have great bread. Fresh baked in store every day. It's worth noting that although Western Beef primarily caters to Latino and Caribbean customers, the owners are Italian and know how to make some of the best semolina bread around.
Like I said, stock was a little light at the end of the day, but you get the idea. The bakery is actually behind these cases, and they're stocked from behind, directly out of the oven -- the way other stores might stock milk.
For folks who don't shop at Western Beef, if you ever find yourself at one, make sure to pick yourself up a semolina loaf and some garlic knots. You will
not regret it. Be aware that not every Western Beef has a bakery though!
Frozen foods in the second-to-last aisle. These cases look new enough that they probably were installed when Western Beef moved in.
Dairy lining the store's right-side wall and continuing on the front wall a little bit with some more charming/creepy decor:
And now for a look along the spacious, open, and extremely bright front-end.
If you've never been, Western Beef is definitely an experience to visit! It's also a solid place to do your weekly food shopping though. We have one more stop all the way out past Bulls Head up next before we wrap up Staten Island!
Western Beef Supermarket
2040 Forest Ave, Graniteville, Staten Island, NY
Photographed July 2018
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