TOUR: CTown Supermarkets - Ossining, NY

CTown Supermarkets

Owner: Sal and Sam Saleh

Opened: 1995

Previous Tenants: Grand Union

Cooperative: Krasdale

Location: 88 Croton Ave, Ossining, NY

Photographed: May 2019

This supermarket, which is located just outside of downtown Ossining, is actually closer to ACME than Green's is, even though the latter two are both in Briarcliff Manor. At 24,000 square feet, it's almost exactly the same size as ACME. It's co-branded CTown (the more recognizable name) and Four Season's Marketplace (the more upscale name, which was added in 2003), and owned by the Saleh family who also own the CTown in Tarrytown.

The building itself is an extensively renovated former Grand Union, which has been expanded out three of the four walls. While the 24,000 square feet is not a huge size, it's certainly a substantial size in an area where its two competitors are 24,000 and 10,000.

Heading in to the grand aisle, which takes up the right side of the store, we find floral in the front corner, with deli and an in-store bakery in the front corner. Prepared foods and then produce line the right side, with seafood at the back of the grand aisle. Meat continues along the back wall of the store, with frozen and dairy in the last aisle and frozen continuing in an alcove in the front.

Closeup of the sweet breads case, which includes traditional Latin American sweet breads along with chocolate chip cookies, muffins, and the like.

Service deli-bakery and prepared foods on the right-side wall of the store.

Prepared and organic produce lines the left side of the produce department, with bulk greens on the right side and loose produce in the middle.

The expansions I mentioned were done by CTown in 2003, while the store was taken over from Grand Union in 1995 (six years before the chain went under). There are no remaining Grand Union features in this store -- I certainly couldn't identify any, and the interior doesn't look anything remotely like any of their store models.

Maximizing the number of stores I visit in a day frequently means getting out early and staying out late. That means no seafood is out yet -- a problem we've had before. More than once.

Looking along the back wall of the store from seafood.

Really nice butcher counter about halfway across the back wall. The flooring looks slightly older in this area, but I'm not familiar with any Grand Union flooring that looked like that.

Nice wood aisle markers.

International aisle.

Because this store is larger than most CTowns, there's a larger selection of nonfood items than most.

This was a little strange. The main display, typically in the first aisle or on a perimeter wall, is in the second-to-last aisle (10).

Dairy and frozen in the last aisle. Notice that the flooring is different on the perimeter.

Higher ceilings on the front-end make for some very cool decor effects in the front corner with frozen foods.

Customer service on this side of the front end, which is nicely designed. I like the higher ceiling (I believe this is mostly an expansion) and the lights focusing on the endcaps to the left.

Once again, everything we're looking at is original to CTown, not Grand Union. This store is the only supermarket in Ossining (home, of course, to Sing Sing), but as we saw, the ACME in Briarcliff Manor is very close by. Ossining is on the Hudson River, and we're going to be turning north now to stay along the water to our next destination -- Croton-on-Hudson. Stay tuned!