TOUR: Stop & Shop - Madison, NJ

Stop & Shop

Opened: 2000

Previous Tenants: Mayfair Foodtown (ca. 1990-1995) > Edwards (1995-2000)

Location: 133 Main St, Madison, NJ

Photographed: December 2019 & December 2020

Welcome to the Rose City! With a population of just about 16,000, Madison isn't exactly a big city, but that's its nickname nonetheless. On the eastern edge of the downtown area, which was once home to an ACME, is this 62,000 square foot Stop & Shop with a very interesting history. (Side note: about half a mile east on Main Street is a Whole Foods, which you can tour here.) I mentioned it in the posts from the former Kings/Mayfair in Berkeley Heights and the Stop & Shop in Berkeley Heights, but Grand Union had been planning to build here in the late 80s while Mayfair was planning to build where the Stop & Shop is now in Berkeley Heights. They reached a deal to swap locations, with Mayfair building here on this property, which was previously (and continues to be) home to a location of local chain Jaeger Lumber, though the lumber company is now in the back of the building; Grand Union took the Berkeley Heights property. Madison became Edwards in 1995/96, then Stop & Shop in 2000; Berkeley Heights became Stop & Shop in 2001.

Here's a slightly older picture from Main Street, showing the store's rather unusual building. The second floor part, to the left, is home to Jaeger Lumber in the back.

For all this store's interesting history and unique location, the interior is sadly deadly boring. Well, at least it's not as bad as some Stop & Shops, but it's kind of the white bread of supermarkets. We see here the earlier version of the fruitbowl decor with white, instead of yellow/beige walls.

Bakery in the front corner, with deli and prepared foods lining the right side of the grand aisle.

But why is the grand aisle so strangely dim? As we'll see, the lighting gets better as we progress through the store.

Produce takes up the left side of the grand aisle.

Seafood and meat line the back wall. Notice that this store does in fact have a functional seafood counter (and one that's staffed, something I complained about in my West Caldwell post)!

Cheese island at the back of the produce department is just barely visible on the left here. This store is very wide and feels enormous inside, and we can get a sense of how wide it is here. If you zoom in, though, and you can see a wall at the far end -- that's not even the store's full width, there's more space beyond that in the front.

The first aisle is mostly sale items, and here we can see two things. First, note that the lighting immediately gets brighter once we get out of the grand aisle. Second, note that the ceiling in most of the store is painted white, but oddly, in the grand aisle, it's painted a darker beige. Why? Black ceilings do well, and white ceilings do well, and even brown ceilings work. But beige just looks dim and dingy.

If nothing else, you can't say the grocery aisles aren't bright!

Something Special in the meat department on the back wall. I think because there is plenty of lighting, but this section of dark ceiling looks great compared to the grand aisle. In fact, I really like the combination of floor, ceiling, and wall color in this meat department alcove.

Dairy takes up the second half of the back wall; as I said, the store is very wide.

Frozen foods are down towards the left side of the store, although they're not quite at the end. As we'll see, there's plenty more after this.

And beyond the frozen cases is a rather expansive nonfoods department. I've found that many of these 1990s/early 00s Super Stop & Shop locations have gigantic general merchandise departments, something not found in the older or newer stores.

Dairy continues along the outside of the last aisle. Here we can also see the secondary entrance/exit on the left side of the storefront. But if you thought those 22 aisles were enough, well you're in for a surprise with aisles 23-28, which run perpendicular to the others in the front section of the store, which appears to be an expansion.

The back half of this expansion is natural foods, and the front half is HABA. Natural frozen and dairy cases line the back wall of the expansion, though as we've seen at other Stop & Shops, the natural section seems to be shrinking.

I suppose it's not too bad, it's just a few rows of orange juice invading the natural section here. I've seen some stores where the entire natural dairy case is just soda. Anyway, notice anything interesting in this picture?

That's right, the Super Stop & Shop (early 00s) decor category markers are still in place in this section! They're both in the natural foods department and the HABA department...

Pharmacy is tucked away all the way in the front corner of this expansion.

I don't know whether the white walls were original to this store's renovation or changed later, but either way, they're much better than the beige ones that seemed to come standard with this decor.

Now let's head back out to the main sales floor for a look at the front end...

But wait, there's more of the Rose City to see! Check out today's store tour of the Whole Foods in town here. And tomorrow, we're finishing up Chatham with one store here on The Market Report and a former supermarket nearby on Grocery Archaeology!