TOUR: Stop & Shop - New Fairfield, CT

Stop & Shop
Opened: 2010

Previous Tenants: Shaw's (2003-2010)

Location: 125 CT-39, New Fairfield, CT

Photographed: July 9, 2021

On Friday we saw the New Fairfield Food Center, a small independent supermarket just diagonally across the street from this Stop & Shop. Although the Food Center has been there since 1969, this store was constructed in 2003 by Shaw's, which ran the store until 2010 when it was sold to Stop & Shop. As we'll see, there's still a fair amount of Shaw's left around the store, even though Stop & Shop has renovated it -- minimally.

We have a very standard Shaw's layout, in which we enter the 60,000 square foot store in the front left corner to produce and then prepared foods and deli in the back left corner of the store. Service seafood is at the back of the grand aisle, with meat on the rest of the back wall. The first aisle has a natural foods department. Frozen and dairy are on the right side of the store, with bakery and pharmacy in the front right corner. Stop & Shop has done very little to the store other than paint the walls and change out signage. I have to wonder, too, if they changed the lighting somehow because the produce department is noticeably too dark -- see above. I haven't noticed the same problem in equivalent Shaw's of this era, although I know Albertsons has replaced lighting in a lot of their stores lately.

Stop & Shop may have replaced a fixture or two here, but mostly they look pretty original. The flooring was definitely not changed. In the back corner we can see a gluten free department, which may have been where Shaw's had cheese. I'm not sure. Cold cuts and some meats are in the refrigerated cases opposite...

Again, I'm not positive which cases are left over from Shaw's since most of the Shaw's I know have had fixtures replaced. Here's a look at what deli and seafood would've looked like in the Shaw's days. Those pictures are from the Webster Square Shaw's in Worcester, where I shopped for five years when I lived in Worcester (although they're not my own pictures). When I was last at Webster Square in November, the store was beginning a remodel but I don't know how extensive it is. We can see how Stop & Shop basically painted the walls and hung one new sign, but didn't really change anything else about the setup.

Many of the CT Stop & Shops still have their service seafood departments, although many of them have been closed in NY and NJ.

Shaw's flooring definitely remains in the natural foods department. My guess is Stop & Shop replaced the shelving, though, because Shaw's natural foods department would've been in the front half of the first two or three aisles, and Stop & Shop's takes up the entire first aisle.

That Webster Square Shaw's, by the way, opened in 2001 in a former Zayre replacing an older location across the mall that's now Marshalls. The older store opened in 1988 when Shaw's acquired the Worcester-based Iandoli's Supermarkets. Webster Square also had an A&P when it opened.

Here we see where Shaw's natural foods department would've extended into the next aisle, but Stop & Shop has moved it all into the first aisle.

Here's a question: what's this store's decor history? I didn't think this decor package was being used as early as 2010, but did this store open with this decor? Did this store use its Shaw's decor until Stop & Shop remodeled closer to 2015? Did it briefly have the fruitbowl decor? The West Caldwell location, which I linked, opened in 2009 with fruitbowl decor.

Aisle 12!

The frozen foods aisle still pretty much looks like Shaw's is in the house...

I believe those are Stop & Shop category markers, but I think everything else is left over from Shaw's.

Dairy is in the last aisle. The Shaw's flooring is very distinctive!

And so is the bakery setup. The bread in the corner is a particularly strong giveaway. We'll see quite a few Shaw's when we're up in New England, and we'll become quite familiar with this store format!

Pharmacy and customer service, to the right of the bakery. Why do these departments get color but hardly any of the others do?

And a look at the front end, which has been relieved of its Shaw's thank you sign (there's another panel to the left that says thank you for shopping at)...

That wraps up our look at this Stop & Shop, and this is our last big chain store for some time! Up next, we're headed around eight miles north to Sherman to check out their small-town supermarket -- don't miss it!