Weis Markets
Opened: 2018
Previous Tenants: A&P (ca. 2000 replacing older store on site - 2015)
Location: 146 Center Grove Rd, Randolph, NJ
Photographed: July 2020
Wow, it's not that often that we tour a Weis here on The Market Report! We saw Hillsborough back in October but none since 2019 before that. Well, I have quite a few Weis locations in NJ and PA coming up soon, including their latest New Jersey location here in a former A&P that was extensively renovated. The 53,000 square foot building also came with a small liquor store elsewhere in the mall...
I referenced the fact that the newest decor package for Weis is quite beautiful, even though we can tell the bones of this building are older. Wait until we get to some of the brand new stores in PA!
I think Weis does a good job at being both modern and an enjoyable shopping experience, along with a baseline of very good prices (one might even say low, low).
The left side wall of the store features prepared food/cafe, deli, and bakery from front to back, with produce on the right side of the grand aisle. Pharmacy and customer service are on the front wall where A&P would've had them, with seafood and meat on the back wall. Weis has added a natural food department in the first aisle and dairy/frozen round out the selection at the right side of the store.
This is a less deluxe version of the Weis decor package, but I really like the way it looks. It's got good personality even though it's fairly standardized. It certainly feels more exciting than what some other competitors are doing. By the way, there's also an ACME in Randolph which we are touring today here.
Bakery in the back corner.
Looking back up towards the front wall. I like the colors, lighting, and flooring here! It's a good color scheme.
Pharmacy and customer service on the front wall between the entrance and exit. Again, I like these colors because they're not overpowering but they brighten up the interior.
Jumping back over to the back wall, we have service butcher and seafood and packaged meats.
Now here's a question. I think this store is attractive, well-run, and well-executed. Why was no one shopping here? I suppose it was a Tuesday afternoon, not a prime shopping time, but I hope this store does well because it's a good store in a good location right out on route 10.
Natural and organic in the first aisle. I love the signage and color scheme, and the fact that there is different lighting in this aisle.
I really like these aisle markers! This was my first time in a Weis with this new decor package and I was not disappointed.
This A&P was never converted to the Fresh Market format, and operated as an A&P Food Market until its final day.
I love this decor that we move into here at the end of the store. Notice also that all these fixtures are brand-new; many of the other fixtures seem to be older and painted.
We also find frozen foods in aisle 15 and one side of 16, the other side of which is dairy. There's an additional frozen alcove in the front corner.
The dairy signage is by far my favorite in the store. I love the backlit elements and great typography across the board!
Looking to the back of the last aisle, and if we turn around 180 degrees we see the frozen alcove...
I love this decor too and the scale is awesome. Moving onto the front end, we see checklane markers that are retro-designed to the point that they almost look like what Milton Glaser was designing for Grand Union in the 1980s! (From this decor package.)
Looking good on the front end too! Now don't forget to check out the ACME in town and tomorrow we introduce our next group to the north!
As good as the decor that Weis put into this place, it still does have the feel of the A&P that was there originally, in fact, this store, and the ACME in Denville, apart from being separate companies, look almost exactly alike.
ReplyDeleteI do think that this store and Denville both have A&P feelings to them, but the work done here is much more extensive than what was done at Denville, right? We have totally new flooring, lighting, all new fixtures, new decor, and a different center-store layout. The bones of Denville are still very much A&P, although ACME has definitely done some work on it. I do think both stores look really good, but this one certainly strikes me as having had much more extensive work.
DeleteHave to say I think this the best décor package Weis has ever had! The meat dept signage could use a little more pep like all the other departments have but it's pretty fine as is. I haven't been in a Weis with this package yet but hope to soon. This store seems like a fun place to shop!
ReplyDeleteYes -- great decor. It is entirely worth checking out a Weis with this decor package, and if you can, one of the newer stores (like the new-build stores that started with this decor package). Really exceptional experience. Plus there are some remodeled stores that are just fantastic (I'm thinking of Doylestown, which is a beautifully renovated former Genuardi's).
DeleteBelow is some history of this site, along with some of my own opinions:
ReplyDelete*For some reason, on Newspapers.com, the archives for the Daily Record only go as far back as July 26, 1974 (so that limits the local research one can do on events that occurred prior to that date). According to a November 5, 1997 article about the store expansion that A&P sought, the original shopping center on the site (called Randolph Plaza) opened in 1968. On December 8, 1997, A&P was granted approval to purchase and demolish the Randolph Plaza and then build a new supermarket and shopping center on site.
*The last day of operation at the old A&P Centennial supermarket was June 5, 1999.
*The A&P Centennial was demolished on June 24, 1999. The building accidentally caught fire during the demolition. Per the June 25, 1999 edition of the Daily Record:
"Flames from a propane torch are being blamed for starting a fire yesterday in a vacant A&P supermarket on Center Grove Road that sent up a thick plume of black smoke that was visible five miles away.
The blaze began around 11:15 a.m. while a small crew of demolition workers were inside the building using propane torches to cut away portions of the building's support beams.
Police believe the workers inadvertently set the fire when flames from the torches ignited a pile of debris near the center of the supermarket, which has been closed since June 5."
*According to the aforementioned 6/25/99 Daily Record article, the new A&P was already under construction when the demolition of the old supermarket was taking place.
*The new A&P--along with the new shopping center--was built quite a ways further back from Center Grove Road.
*The new Randolph A&P opened in March 2000.
*Most likely due to the A&P/Pathmark merger, the nearby Randolph Pathmark--which opened in 1971 (or possibly 1970)--closed on August 14, 2009. Acme Style wrote a great profile of this Pathmark back in 2010:
https://acmestyleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/pathmark-randolf-new-jersey.html
*The official opening date for the Randolph Weis was July 19, 2018.
*Though I've never been in this store when it was a Weis, this decor looks really beautiful.
*I was surprised that ShopRite, Acme, and Stop & Shop all decided not to acquire this former A&P. Perhaps ShopRite was worried that it was too close to its Succasunna store, and it appears that Acme saw no reason to move due to its success in its current Randolph supermarket (even though the A&P/Weis building is in a better location). I find Stop & Shop's decision to pass on this location to be quite puzzling, since there's a pretty good distance between this Weis and Stop & Shop's Morris Plains store.
--A&P Fan
Thanks for the details!
DeleteI visited this store for the first time yesterday. The store was certainly pleasant and clean, but the decor and overall atmosphere felt a bit underwhelming. And I was surprised at just how relatively few shoppers there were in a store of this size. (I visited from about 6:00 to 6:30 P.M. on a Friday evening, and I would estimate that there was a total of one to two dozen shoppers in the store.)
ReplyDeleteIn the comments section of your profile of the ShopRite of Brookdale (in Bloomfield), there was discussion that in spite of that supermarket's amazing new decor package, its tile-to-concrete conversion was rather flawed. At the Randolph Weis, there were definite problems with the tile-to-concrete conversion, as there were a lot of visible scars from the tiling which A&P had. The tile-to-concrete conversion was done better at the Randolph Weis than at the Brookdale ShopRite (based upon your photos of that store, as I've never been there), but it was far from perfect.
On a different matter, I have long been trying to find a photo of the former Centennial A&P that was demolished. Though I couldn't find a photo of the store on Newspapers.com or anywhere else online, here's a link to a very interesting YouTube video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2NBrqLo7bg
As indicated in the video's title, the above footage was shot in 1988 and captures someone driving from Ralph's Market (which I know nothing about) to the Randolph A&P. During the final minute of the video, you can definitely see the old Centennial and its shopping center.
--A&P Fan
I apologize for being so nitpicky, but there is actually some confusion as to whether the YouTube video I shared was shot in 1985 or 1988. While the video's title says that it was filmed in 1988, the video's description says that the footage was shot in July 1985. (This particular matter obviously makes little difference as it pertains to the Randolph A&P shopping center, but there may have been quite a bit of development during those three years at the other places featured in that video.)
DeleteSo long as I am replying to my own comment, I wanted to clarify something else that I wrote above. When I stated that "I visited this store for the first time," I was specifically referring to the Randolph Weis, as I did visit the A&P (more than a dozen times) that operated in the same building from 2000 to 2015. I unfortunately never visited the old Centennial, though I did go past it a few times while in a car. I remember being bummed out when I first read about the Centennial's demolition, as it occurred during a time when A&P was aggressively replacing so many Centennials.
I hope to return to this Weis Markets again, as I will be curious to see if there are more customers in the store. This supermarket is far from perfect, but aside from being clean and pleasant (as I previously mentioned), I was impressed with the prices. (IMO, while the prices were still too high--owing to the inflation the country is currently experiencing--I'm not sure if they were any higher than even what ShopRite is currently charging.) Weis does seem like a more worthy competitor to ShopRite than either Acme or Stop & Shop, so I hope this location isn't a money loser. I'm guessing that this location may be in less danger of closing than the Hillsborough location, simply because I believe the latter store is more geographically distant from the other Weis Markets in New Jersey. Also, it's possible that Weis got a really good deal from the landlord when it came to rental payments, since the building was vacant for nearly three years and the landlord may have realized that it would be unlikely that Acme, Stop & Shop, or ShopRite would ever want to open a supermarket at that shopping center.
--A&P Fan
Thanks for the detailed history and your thoughts on this Weis!
DeleteI've noticed that Weis in NJ frequently beats ShopRite on price, and easily beats both Stop & Shop and ACME. Out in PA, they tend to beat Giant, although I do think those are closer than the NJ stores are.