TOUR: ACME Markets - Lincroft, NJ

ACME Markets

Opened: 1999 replacing 1950s-era store next door, which was demolished

Previous Tenants: none

Location: 616 Newman Springs Rd, Lincroft, NJ

Photographed: December 2020

The Market Report comes to beautiful Lincroft! Beautiful, of course, being the adjective to describe the ACME and not the town, though the town is quite nice too. Acme Style has covered this store many times but I figured I needed to get out here for myself. I'm glad I did, as it's one of the most beautiful ACMEs in the northern/central NJ area.

The 41,000 square foot store was built in 1999 and underwent an extensive renovation in late 2016, holding a grand reopening in February 2017. I visited the store almost four years later (holy moly, time flies) at the very end of 2020 to find it looking just as good as (re-) opening day.

We enter to a beautiful grand aisle on the right side, with produce and meat/seafood lining the outside of the aisle, and bakery-deli in an island facing. Quality Built looks especially good here, and I think it's because the bones of Chalkboard Market look great but I was never a fan of the decor itself -- it seemed a bit too close to Food Fair's 1970s-era decor for me.

Bakery looking amazing at the front of the island.

The former salad bar area has been converted to produce prep, with upright packaged deli cases lining the sales floor side. This is on the outside wall (right side at the back of the grand aisle).

Deli, decorated with stockings for Christmas, at the back of the island.

Service meat and seafood is at the back of the grand aisle, and notice that the backsplash remains on the back wall behind all of the service counters. I must say I do not love it.

Spacious and bright meat department along the back wall. There is a drop ceiling over the grocery aisles, which I do wish wasn't there, but it's still very attractively done.

(I say that and then put a picture of the aisles with no drop ceiling. The drop ceiling doesn't quite extend all the way to the ends of the aisles, but is definitely there in the middles, I promise.)

In an A&P-style layout, frozen foods run up the middle of the store. The frozen food cases line one side of aisle 8 and both sides of 9, out of 14 aisles in total.

I do apologize for the wonky pictures. This was at the tail end of the life of my old cell phone.

Quality Built category markers looking very good with the crown moulding tastefully placed on the columns necessary to support the store.

Dairy begins on the back wall, and then continues down the last aisle. There's a pharmacy counter at the front of the last aisle as well.

Notice that, like we saw in Montclair, there are simultaneously two generations of category markers here in dairy. I'm not entirely sure why that didn't show up in other stores, or if they have, I've kind of missed them.

Oof. Not a great picture of the pharmacy, which I didn't notice until I'd left the store. Here's Acme Style's photo. Note that although Sav-On remains outside the store, it's long gone inside.

Totally brand-new floral department in the front corner next to pharmacy. It looks beautiful!

A great-looking front end with the retro-inspired logo! I do wish that logo appeared in more places, mostly on the storefronts. Oh well. Anyhow, we have one more store before we wrap up Northern & Central Monmouth, and that's just to the south of here which we'll be taking a look at tomorrow on Grocery Archaeology!