195 Mill St, Worcester, MA

Original Grocery Tenant: Big D Supermarket
Address: 195 Mill St, Webster Square, Worcester, MA

Opened: 1960s

Closed: 1995

Later Tenants: Price Chopper (1995-2001)

Photographed: October 28, 2018 and October 9, 2020

To most people in Worcester, the hulking 30,000 square foot carcass of the former Big D Supermarket on Mill Street near Coes Reservoir is nothing but an eyesore. I think it's a cool part of the city's supermarket history.

This store was constructed by Big D at some point in the 1960s, and it was open by 1969. (Using Historic Aerials, we can narrow it down further: open by 1966 but nothing there in 1960.) As a side note, according to the city directories, it seems that Big D was short for Big Discount. They were also related, it seems, to several other chains including Wonder Market. I wonder (ha) if there was ever a relation to the Wonder Market in Glen Rock, NJ, such as a long-gone cooperative or something. At the same time, it's possible Wonder Market was a member and Big D was the cooperative, since there was another store in Worcester called Whitman's Big D for a short time. Others seem to have been co-branded as "Big D Wonder Market."

Price Chopper acquired Big D in 1995, and several of the stores they acquired were replaced shortly thereafter (see Southwest Cutoff before and after, and Webster before and after). Others were simply renovated in place. Although Price Chopper operated a store here for several years, they eventually moved to a new-build location at Main and Cambridge in 2001.

This is not necessarily an ideal place for a supermarket, in my opinion. It's on Mill Street, a somewhat strange thorough fare going north-south through the far western part of town towards the airport. This store is directly across from the Coes Reservoir, a large reservoir, where there's a small beach along Mill Street. You can move around in that Google Maps street view to see there's not a whole lot of other commercial activity going on around here, and it's kind of hidden out of the way of most of the Webster Square traffic and south of the next cluster of businesses, which is up in Tatnuck. The Price Chopper is only 3/4 of a mile south of this location, but it feels like a different world.

As we can see, not much happened here after Price Chopper closed up shop. The windows in the front were boarded up, and the signs were removed, and it looks like the building was painted, but that's about it.

Let's take a closer look at the building!

Depending on your view, it's either really sad news or excellent news that demolition has begun (paywall) on this building, for a new housing development. If you're interested (who am I kidding, you're here, you're definitely interested) you can actually see inside the building here.

But I got a very extensive set of pictures from just before that, including signs faded beyond recognition left in the parking lot.

Apparently a distinctive feature of Big D stores was their brightly colored panels in the front, which it seems Price Chopper attempted to hide with beige paint.

It's also possible the building was painted beige after being vacated.

I'm not totally sure of the layout of this store, but it looks like the front-end would've faced the side of the building (seen below) and not the street.

I'm very glad I got to see this store -- many times, actually -- before the building is gone forever! And now you all get to see a glimpse of it too. Have a great weekend, and on Monday, it'll be time for more former supermarkets near Webster Square!