GIANT Food Stores
Opened: 2019
Previous Tenants: none; Kmart previously on site
Location: 300 Lincoln Ave, East Stroudsburg, PA
Photographed: January 15, 2021
The largest supermarket in East Stroudsburg is this store, the GIANT Food Stores just to the east of downtown Stroudsburg. The 66,000 square foot store opened on the site of a former
Kmart in 2019 and is very similar, although an earlier model, to the
Doylestown store. 33,000 square feet at the other end of the Pocono Plaza was previously a
Weis, but that store closed in 2011.
The store is very beautiful, but isn't quite as exciting as Doylestown. As I've mentioned previously with GIANT, this decor package feels very low-end because it's so simple and bland.
One difference between this store and Doylestown is that the bakery, deli, and prepared foods departments are on the perimeter of the store, rather than in an island opposite produce. Prepared foods take up the left side of the store -- although there's a much smaller selection of prepared foods than Doylestown, and fewer features -- with deli in the back left corner and bakery at the back of the grand aisle. Produce is on the right side of the grand aisle, with meat and seafood on the back wall. Frozen and dairy are on the far right side of the store, with pharmacy in the front right corner.
Notice that this area looks a lot like
older remodeled stores, with the drop ceiling over the service departments.
In general, although this store is very nice, it doesn't feel all that different from a remodeled 90s store, other than a few isolated features.
Here's a look up towards the front of the grand aisle.
On the back wall we have the meat and seafood departments.
Nature's Promise organic and natural selection in the first aisle.
Again we see a very low-end, warehouse type look in the grocery aisles. I'm not sure what the decision was behind this look, but I can't say I particularly like it for GIANT. It doesn't feel like it works particularly well.
Nice service meat and seafood counter, though. And the HABA department features the really attractive lit shelving that we've seen in some of the newer ShopRites and others...
Down at the far right end of the store, we come into frozen foods and dairy.
The store is very spacious and clean, and there's plenty of room to navigate, which is a plus for sure. Does this store ever get really crowded?
But again, we see very basic, low-end department signage that seems to fit better in a discount store or a warehouse store...
There's a little bit of color on the walls with these pictures in the last aisle, but I don't fully understand why these decor elements aren't extended throughout the store.
Pharmacy in the front corner, with the front end next to that.
Again, plenty attractive, but just very boring for a brand-new (or almost brand-new) store.
This store used to have a competitor just under half a mile away, but as GIANT was preparing to open this store, that competitor was preparing a new store of their own. Check out the former ShopRite in Stroudsburg on
Grocery Archaeology tomorrow!
The interior of this Giant is slightly better than the dull interior at the Hellertown location, though it is nowhere near as attractive as the inside of the Doylestown supermarket.
ReplyDeleteTo give this Giant some praise, I do think that the "Tetris blocks" style exterior (surrounding the "GIANT" sign) is pretty cool. I have seen this exterior feature on a number of other Giants (including the Doylestown store), and it does succeed in creating a unique exterior look for the chain. Out of curiosity, is the "Tetris blocks" style exterior unique to the Giant-Carlisle chain, or can it be found on other some other stores owned by Ahold?
Agreed. This interior is nice enough but unremarkable. And as Retail Regents says below, yes, the exterior is also present on the Milford Stop & Shop, and perhaps others.
DeleteThis store looks completely underwhelming to me. The decor is lost in the high ceilings and it is very blah considering the vastness of the space. Nothing on the walls "pop". Ahold has been using this decor in Giant-MD stores that still retain their original or close to original pre-Ahold layout. The decor looks much better in stores like this because there is much less vertical space and drop ceilings which makes the decor stand out better. A better choice for the store on this page would be the something like comic style decor that Ahold used in the 2000s for their big dual entrance locations. That decor really stood out against the vastness of the building and gave the store a bit of a fun feeling.
ReplyDeleteTo A&P Fan: I think this exterior is unique to Giant-PA. Ahold built one new Giant-MD location and relocated another near me. Both use a wood style exterior but without the Tetris style background. See these two links for examples:
Fairfax, VA The Scout at the Circle: https://goo.gl/maps/XZpZffyM9v7gbSRq9 New Build
Manassas, VA Bull Run Plaza: https://goo.gl/maps/B7ixTiki88jt7iat5 Relocation
M. Hale, thanks for answering my question about the Tetris style exterior being unique to Giant-PA.
DeleteI agree with your assessment about this Giant's interior appearance (although the Hellertown Giant has an even worse interior, IMO). While I think that this location's exterior is unique and cool, such a feature does very little to make up for a boring and unattractive interior.
The Tetris-style exterior is not actually exclusive to Giant-PA; there are Stop & Shop locations with it, such as one store in Milford, MA which opened in 2017, ironically out of a former Kmart like this store, and was a replacement for an older octagonal Super Stop & Shop.
DeleteRetail Regents, thanks for informing me that the Tetris-style exterior is not exclusive to Giant-PA. I saw an online photo of the Milford, MA Stop & Shop, and its exterior looks really cool.
DeleteI really liked Stop & Shop's octagonal store design. Though I realize this is off-topic, are there any of those S&S octagonal supermarkets still in operation (excluding any such stores that have had its exterior facade altered beyond recognition)? For that matter, are there any (unaltered) S&S locations still in operation which predate the octagonal design?
A&P Fan, I'm not honestly sure about the octagonal store design but my guess is there's still at least a store or two in Connecticut or Rhode Island that still has it. Off the top of my head, I believe the Acton, MA Stop & Shop predates that design but I'm not positive that it wasn't an earlier-built store that Stop & Shop bought much later. I've photographed the store but haven't researched its history fully yet.
DeleteI forgot one thing. At the other end of this strip mall there was a Weis location with the old 70s style brown awning exterior. Based on Google Maps it would be where HomeGoods is located now. Weis closed in February 2011. I was in the old Weis a couple of years after it closed when the space was a book clearance store. The interior was the 80s/90s pastel that Weis used in many of their stores. The book clearance place left up all of the decor except the actual descriptive words like Produce, Dairy, etc. I wish I could have taken pictures but this was before I had a cell phone. I give Weis credit for going as long as they did with a Walmart Supercenter across the street. I wonder if Giant-PA will have a better go of it with Walmart still in close proximity.
ReplyDeleteThat's awesome! I knew there was a Weis there but didn't realize the later tenant had left so much of the decor intact.
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