The Fresh Market
Opened: 2013
Previous Tenants: A&P (1960s-2012)
Location: 75 Washington Valley Rd, Pluckemin, Bedminster, NJ
Photographed: November 2020
It's time for our first store tour of a Fresh Market! We previously saw a quick look at one up in Westport, CT, and the ALDI in Livingston used to be one as well. Livingston and Bedminster (here, which is also sometimes called Pluckemin, the name of the unincorporated neighborhood here) opened at the same time, but while Livingston was poorly executed in an area with high competition, Bedminster has done quite well with only a Kings nearby (tour the store here), an affluent market, and execution that's clearly been refined over the years.
The 20,000 square foot space was an A&P until 2013 when they lost their lease. Today, The Fresh Market has basically no remnants of the A&P around, not even the facade which looks like it could be built around the centennial facade of the former A&P but is in fact all new.
The front right quarter of the store is a spacious produce and floral department, with deli/bakery in an island in the back and meat/seafood lining the back wall. Grocery, dairy, and frozen are in the front left quarter. As we'll see, there's some inventive merchandising that makes this store a lot more appealing than I remember Livingston being.
Here we move into the back section with the service departments. The only thing I found a bit strange about this setup is that there are no department signs, making it a bit hard to navigate. But I'm sure you get used to it.
Looking across the back wall of the store, with meat/seafood on the right and deli/prepared foods on the left. Bakery seems to be a bit scattered, with some products in the island on the left, some products displayed in shelving between the two sides, and the service counter on the back wall to the right.
Looks like meat is much bigger of a priority than seafood, which is small and tucked away in the back corner here. As we see, the butcher counter is quite large.
A few more shots of the deli island...
Nicely merchandised cheeses on the front of the island here.
Since The Fresh Market (shockingly) focuses on fresh products, the grocery aisles and traditional departments like dairy and frozen are cut way back in size. Let's head into the grocery aisles...
Once again, because this isn't so much a traditional supermarket, there aren't exactly aisle markers but instead these category markers around directing people to types of products.
Looking back towards the produce department on the far side of the store.
Frozen foods line the left wall of the store. I have to say that a lot of stores have lately been bringing back the aggressively more-is-more design sensibility and I love it! Mostly -- some stores just have too much stuff on the walls without actually tying it all together. The Fresh Market here has a pleasantly old-world-market type decor.
Moving into the front of the grocery department, we find some fun merchandising ideas that unfortunately didn't transition too well into the coronavirus, with the bulk foods temporarily switched over to packaged items. Still an impressive selection...
Healthy stuff, and not-so-healthy stuff...
And heading back up to the front end, we have a beautiful wood structure over the registers.
This Fresh Market is a quite fun place! And a beautiful reuse of a former A&P. Make sure to tour the Kings just up the street here, and tomorrow, we are heading to the northeast along route 287 to Bernardsville for two stores here on The Market Report and one on Grocery Archaeology!
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