Price Chopper
Opened: 2012
Do we have any readers of The Market Report who are familiar with Price Chopper? The chain, based in Schenectady, NY, has locations throughout the eastern part of upstate New York, some in northeastern Pennsylvania, and some across Connecticut and western and central Massachusetts. They're owned by the newly-formed Northeast Grocery, which also owns Tops Friendly Markets. I really like Tops, but to be honest I really don't like Price Chopper. This store really made me think twice about that opinion.
The 50,000 square foot store was constructed new in 2012, so it's rather new. Maintenance here, like the Foodtown down the street, is excellent, and the store seems to be much higher-volume than the Price Choppers around me in central Massachusetts. We enter to a really beautiful grand aisle with produce on the left side and a cafe, prepared foods, and deli lining the right side. Bakery and seafood are at the back, with meats on the rest of the back wall. Dairy and frozen are at the left side of the store along with floral. It's a very standard Price Chopper layout, one that we'll see a few more times.
The Market Cafe is today home to the beer and wine department. And in deli and prepared foods, I was amazed to see all of the service counters fully stocked, given that at my local Price Chopper, almost the entire department is empty.
My complaints with other Price Choppers aside, this one looks great and seemed to be very well-run. All the service departments and perishables were fully stocked, freshness looked great, and the selection and pricing seemed quite solid.
I don't mind this decor but the subsequent decor package, such as Webster, and the Market 32 decor are both much better.
I also like the polished concrete floor here. So shiny, too!
Seafood and meat continuing along the back wall as we see here.
HABA is in the first few aisles. I don't believe there's a pharmacy here but I'm not sure.
And the butcher shop across from HABA.
There's not a whole lot to see in the grocery aisles, but they're clean and well-stocked. The store feels bright and airy, and the skylights help with that.
These frozen cases look much older than the store, and although it's possible they just look older than they are, it's also possible they were brought in secondhand for this store's opening.
Same goes for the dairy coolers. They look older than the store, but I'm not sure whether they are.
Either way, they're in excellent condition.
Certain Price Choppers have the floral next to the entrance, where this store has a coffee shop. Others put the bagels and donuts there, with the rest of the bakery in the back corner.
And a look across the spacious front-end before we move along...
Opened: 2012
Previous Tenants: none
Location: 4547 Milford Rd, East Stroudsburg, PA
Photographed: January 15, 2021
While the Foodtown seems to do just fine for the last 10 years that this store has been here, another nearby supermarket didn't make it. Head over to Grocery Archaeology to check out a former supermarket about a mile southwest of here tomorrow!
The only thing I know about Price Chopper is that 25 years ago, when I worked at Foodtown, we were encouraged to not shop there as they were non-union.
ReplyDeleteHaving ties to the Wyoming Valley, I've very familiar with Price Chopper, and can remember the days when Price Chopper still had stores in the area with neon interior signs and the funky horizontal aisles. In the valley itself, Price Chopper does very well, and they've really ingrained themselves as part of the various communities there. They've also built up a decent store count in the area too. When in the area we shop there fairly often, as we like their fresh departments.
ReplyDeleteInteresting! I'd love to see one of those old neon Price Choppers but, at least as far as I know, none are left. It's a little strange but I guess it makes sense that Price Chopper has a large presence in the Wyoming Valley. This store was definitely well-run and I understand the Wyoming Valley ones are too, but Matamoras was very poorly-run when I visited. (I wanted one item, cream cheese, and every package of the storebrand cream cheese was expired. That's more the experience I'm used to with PC from Worcester.) Of course, Matamoras is a Market 32 now, and I haven't been back to check it out.
DeleteObviously, we have a large number of Price Chopper stores around here, being just a bit south of Albany (which is only a few miles from Schenectady).
ReplyDeleteThey have started to (slowly) convert them to that Market 32 banner, but it seems to have kind of "stalled out" as of late, though we also have at least two (Chatham and Shaker Road in Albany) that are signed as Price Chopper but opened (a replacement for a store they bought from Grand Union, the other an enlarged former Grand Union in that order) just a short time before the new name was announced, and those two have decor very similar to the Market 32 style. They also managed to renovate two stores in Albany proper (Delaware Ave. and Madison Ave.) that are both very small (probably dating back to Central Markets days, and in areas where expansion/replacement is not an option). There is also at least one other small store that hasn't been redone (Cohoes) last I knew.
I know I've seen this decor in at least a couple stores but not sure off the top of my head which ones, though one may have been the Hudson (Greenport) store that closed and is now ShopRite (with the flag design behind the name on the glass front, even though that is the more square style unlike this one with the point).
Not certain how they got into this (PA) area - I know the Mass. (Worcester) ones were an acquisition of a small chain years ago, and they have a few still in the Berkshires (though the smaller ones there have closed in the last few years) but nothing in between (Springfield), even when the opportunity came up (A&P locations when they left that area, including some pretty new stores).
Interestingly, Price Chopper entered PA organically in the 1980's by building two stores in Scranton, and grew from there. A lot of the big names in Eastern PA grocery (ShopRite, Giant-Carlisle, and Weis) were virtually non-existent in the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre area at the time, and the area was primarily served by local chains (Insalaco's, Mr. Z's, various ShurSave affiliates) and Acme (A&P had left the area in the early part of the 1980's, right before PC entered). PC saw an opportunity to enter an area with a lack of big names at the time, and it worked. All of the older 1980's PC stores in NEPA have been replaced with larger stores in the 1990's and 2000's, and they seem to do well in the area still.
DeleteI know two other stores that have the newer package you're talking about - Little Falls (opened 2012) and Warrensburg (opened 2014).
DeleteAs someone who has visited many PC stores around upstate NY, this decor package is actually quite common, with a good number of stores around the Capital Region and Mohawk Valley bearing this package (including several stores that have since been converted to the Market32 name). The one in Westgate Plaza and the energy-efficiency prototype in Colonie got this decor fairly early (WG from its 2008 "International" remodel and Colonie when they replaced their older store in 2009) and are still signed as Price Chopper.
I was thinking Westgate was one that looked like this location. Haven't been to Colonie (at 155) recently, but have been there as well in the past - thank you for confirming that I had seen it in stores locally :)
DeleteIn terms of what I was referring to with Chatham and Shaker Road (Albany), those stores look pretty much like the Market 32 renovation design (such as used in East Greenbush), without a few features (like the small sections at the back end of each aisle with specialized items) - that may be since they were just prior to the official changeover, or it may be that both are smaller stores and just don't have room for those.
This is a fascinating discussion.
DeleteRegarding A&P, they were still operating stores in Northeastern PA into the 1990s (which never converted to Super Fresh), although I do not know if any of them were that close to the Stroudsburg area. A February 11, 1985 ad in The Pottsville Republican listed the following A&P locations: Branch Township, Brodheadsville, Hughesville, Lehighton, Mount Pocono, Tamaqua, Towanda, and Tunkhannock. The Tamaqua store closed on July 31, 1992, and the Lehighton supermarket shut its doors on October 22, 1994. There is a decent chance that the Mount Pocono store was still open in October 1996, since a 10/25/96 newspaper article mentioned the prior evening's theft of the wheel covers of somebody's car in the Mount Pocono A&P parking lot. (This would imply that the Mount Pocono store was still open, although this individual could have parked her car in the parking lot of a supermarket which had closed.) The Mount Pocono supermarket may very well have been the last supermarket to operate under the A&P name in Pennsylvania.
The Albertsons Florida Blog webmaster alluded to the fact that Acme had a presence in Northeastern PA in the 1980s. Did all of the region's Acmes close in late 1994 or early 1995, along with all remaining Acme supermarkets in New York State? (I believe this to be the case, though I am not 100% sure.) I am surprised that Acme had so much trouble in Northeastern PA in the mid-1990s if there were so few big chains to compete with. Was an inability to compete with Price Chopper one of the main reasons why Acme pulled out of the area?
Not too surprising that A&P had scattered stores elsewhere like you mention. Those towns you list sound like ones that could be small, possibly the type with only one supermarket in the town (as are most of the ones I list below).
DeleteWe are just south of Albany (NY), and while the majority of A&P stores had closed in the early 1980's around here, there was one lonely one in Wynantskill (small village just outside of Troy) that lasted until April of 1997. There were a couple in the Adirondacks (Saranac Lake and Tupper Lake) that went even later (2000 range) and one in the Catskills (Margaretville, about 25-30 miles west of Kingston) that was around until maybe 10 years before the chain went totally out (and that one was at least an hour's drive from Pleasant Valley, which was otherwise the northernmost one that lasted until the final bankruptcy).
Unfortunately, I have no information on your Acme question, as I think I only saw them later on, mainly in NJ and MD (down towards the shore, like between Assatague and Annapolis as I remember - only because that was a Scout trip, and the kids thought the name was funny, probably thinking of the cartoons).
@A&P Fan - Just to clarify, when I said A&P left the area in the 1980's, I was specifically referring to the Wyoming Valley, not the broader region (although I had no idea A&P was still operating stores in the Poconos into the 1990's).
DeleteIt was early 1995 when all the NEPA and the few remaining Southern Tier NY Acme stores were sold to Penn Traffic. At least in the Wyoming Valley, the former Acme stores were converted to either Bi-Lo or Insalaco's depending on location, and the vast majority of the stores closed within a handful of years after converting. Price Chopper actually bought one of the castoff former Acme->Penn Traffic stores in the late 1990's (the Midway Shopping Center location in Wyoming, which still has the layout of a late 1990's Insalaco's inside following a renovation Penn Traffic did after acquiring the building).
Acme as a whole seemed to be shrinking a lot through the 1980's and 1990's, with the sales of stores in outer regions most likely being a way to raise money to invest in the core Philadelphia/South Jersey stores. Acme in the Wyoming Valley went back years (to the 1950s at least) and they grew to a very respectable presence in the area by the early 1990's. I wouldn't blame Price Chopper for chasing Acme out of the area, but more so Acme's corporate woes at the time and the company's desire to focus on core regions. Right around the time Acme pulled out of NEPA was when Weis purchased the local Mr. Z's chain (which was an IGA affiliate prior to the sale), which finally brought another big name to the area with a respectable presence.
BillyGr and Albertsons Florida Blog, thank you both for your informative responses.
DeleteTo BillyGr, it was odd that A&P operated some scattered supermarkets in Upstate New York for so long. The Margaretville location apparently lasted until January 2009, according to a thread on the Groceteria message board which somebody started on 1/8/09:
https://www.groceteria.ca/board/viewtopic.php?t=2558
To Albertsons Florida Blog, I did not know that the vast majority of the Acme supermarkets which converted to Bi-Lo or Insalaco's in the Wyoming Valley were open for a relatively brief time after converting. On the Newspapers.com website, I found an interesting ad in the 1/21/95 edition of the Standard-Speaker (a Hazleton, PA newspaper) which listed the former Acme stores which had converted to the Insalaco's banner: Berwick, Carbondale, Clarks Summit, Dallas, Dunmore, Edwardsville, Halstead, Hawley, Hazleton, Honesdale, Jim Thorpe, Lansford, Montrose, Mountaintop, Pittston, Pottsville, Scranton, Shavertown, Tamaqua, and Wilkes-Barre, plus the Wyoming store which you mentioned.
The ones further north were a bit odd (though they also had a few scattered ones in New England and some as far east as Springfield MA for quite a while as well - including at least one outside Springfield that was fairly new when they left that area and retreated to just the few CT locations that stuck around through bankruptcy), and they tended to be spots with less competition (out of the 4 spots I described, Saranac was the only one with any other market, that being two Grand Unions, one almost next to the A&P). That was also an unusual spot where they stuck around after their (GU) bankruptcy and kept both stores through a Tops back to GU back to Tops switch before one finally closed).
DeleteMargaretville makes even more sense, due to the lack of any other markets, probably until you get back to Kingston (so the most convenient store for several smaller towns out that way), plus that it was out enough but still moderately closer to the cluster they kept to the end in Dutchess County and south from there towards NYC/NJ compared to the other "outlyers" to be able to serve it easily enough.
Thank you all for such extensive comments and history here. So interesting to read!
DeleteNot much to add except that I am familiar with the newer decor (similar to Little Falls) from the Webster, Mass store which I've photographed. I've photographed a few Price Chopper stores in central Mass. My understanding is that the only Price Choppers in MA are in Worcester and its suburbs (Webster, Shrewsbury, Spencer, Hopkinton), with one location each in the Montachusett Region (Gardner) and the Berkshires (Great Barrington). Am I missing any? I know they had at least one store in Framingham through their acquisition of Big D/Wonder Market, as well as one in Lee that closed, and there may have been more around Mass that have closed since.
In terms of the Berkshires, they had a few stores (and still do).
DeleteThere were two stores at one point in WIlliamstown/ North Adams/Adams. One was along Route 2 between Williamstown and North Adams (a small plaza with just the PC, probably late 70's/early 80's size and a couple small shops), and that one closed a few years back. The other was along Route 8 between North Adams and Adams - a plaza with that, one other larger store space and a few smaller spots (a bit bigger than the other one, but still on the smaller side) and that one closed even earlier (maybe early 2000's)?
Heading South, there is a store in Pittsfield. That one is off of Route 8/9, in a plaza with Walmart, Home Depot and quite a few other stores. That one is newer (the glass front style) and I think may have gotten the Market 32 redo. It moved from a plaza at the intersection of 8/9 and Merrill Road, which was a standard Kmart/Price Chopper combo originally.
Next South is a store in Lenox on US 7 - just barely into Lenox from Pittsfield (in fact the Stop & Shop one light north is technically Pittsfield).
This store is even newer (maybe 2015ish), replacing a smaller store in the same plaza, after a vacant part of an Ames was demolished (the rest of said Ames was Marshalls last I know).
Then you had the Lee store you mention (that one was very small), and the Great Barrington one.
That is all I know of on the Berkshires side, and then as you say nothing until Worcester area (which was the acquisition you mentioned). Never sure why they didn't open elsewhere between, particularly when stores were closing (such as A&P, which they bought from in other spots).
Thanks for adding those locations! I agree, it's a little strange they didn't take advantage of some opportunities to expand into the Springfield area. I wouldn't be surprised if there were also former Mott's ShopRite stores up for sale at some point, although I know a lot of them became Price Rites. Seems like a missed opportunity, but on the other hand, Big Y is very strong in that area and their MA stores don't quite seem to be executed quite as well as Big Y, which is perimeter-heavy in a lot of stores with big bakery, deli, prepared foods, and seafood departments.
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