Stop & Shop
Opened: ca. 2005
The Mount Vernon Stop & Shop, located on the southern end of town right near the border with the Bronx, is the last of four Stop & Shops that are set to close and become Food Bazaars this fall. We're also seeing the other four locations today, which are Carlstadt, Piscataway, and Coney Island. This is the largest by far, at over 80,000 square feet. That'll also make it the second-largest Food Bazaar, with the largest just slightly bigger at 83,000 square feet. What will Food Bazaar do with all that space? Hard to say, and it's also hard to say exactly what's going on here. There's some disagreement on social media whether Food Bazaar is moving from their location in downtown Mount Vernon or opening a second city location. (Personally, I think it's unlikely Food Bazaar would move, and I think it's more likely they'd open another location here.) Meanwhile, apparently the city government sent Food Bazaar a cease and desist letter last week, saying they didn't have proper licenses and permits to begin operating at this location. A local self-proclaimed community activist accused the city of attempting to force out a legitimate replacement tenant for this supermarket to facilitate plans to rezone the area and redevelop it with other land uses. I have no idea of any details of that controversy, and no idea who's right or wrong, but if things go to schedule Stop & Shop is set to close this store this Thursday, 9/5, and it will be transferred to Food Bazaar's possession the following day. We'll see if that happens.
I actually visited this store on July 12, the same day that Stop & Shop made the closing announcement. So at that point, management definitely had known this store was closing for a while, but it wasn't official until then.
We enter to the grand aisle on the right side of the store, with the bakery in the front right corner and deli/prepared foods along the rest of the right-side wall. Produce and a very large cheese island are in the middle of the store, with seafood and meat on the back wall. Cold cuts, beer, and dairy take up the rest of the back wall, with dairy continuing down the last aisle. Frozen foods and HABA are also on the left side of the store. A floral department and a closed pharmacy are in the front left corner. There was also previously a bank branch inside the store, which I believe was on the front-end.
If Food Bazaar does successfully end up moving in here, they're going to have to figure out what to do with all the space. The grand aisle is a pretty normal setup, but there are a heck of a lot of grocery aisles after that (21 to be exact, which is the same number as there are in the Cropsey Avenue store -- but this store is much deeper, almost a square, actually.
I do like this decor a lot, although now it's starting to show its age. Maintenance at this store has been quite good, though, and while the store is a little dingy and a little outdated, it's by no means dirty.
A very large cheese island takes up the space behind produce opposite the deli. Based on the level of perishables stock I saw (even as the store was preparing to close), I don't think this store's sales volume is that low. Placer.ai estimates this store's foot traffic is only slightly lower than the downtown Food Bazaar's, although of course that store is about 20,000 square feet smaller than this one.
Half a mile south, in the village of Pelham right on the border of the Bronx, a 75,000 square foot Fairway was acquired by Village Super Market in 2020 and became a ShopRite in 2022. The conversion brought a major renovation, and a shift from the higher-end and specialty Fairway positioning to the more mainstream, lower-priced ShopRite program. That was probably the final nail in the coffin for this Stop & Shop.
Still, the store has been kept up well over the years. This one even still has a very substantial service seafood department, as many stores have closed their service seafood counters. A look across the back wall...
This store has roughly the same decor package and setup (although in a mirror image) as the store Food Bazaar just acquired in Bridgeport, CT. As I mentioned on the other posts, it's hard to tell exactly what Food Bazaar's plan is with these locations, and just how extensive their renovations will be.
But because this store is quite a bit larger (the Bridgeport location is 55,000 square feet, or 25,000 square feet smaller than this one), it remains to be seen just exactly how Food Bazaar uses all this space.
The decor has held up really nicely in the last 20 years, though.
Meat and cold cuts then transition to beer, which is also in one of the grocery aisles. There's an unusual walk-in beer cooler here, and I wonder if that's a product of this store being very large, or was simply built into the former meat room when Stop & Shop stopped preparing meat in-store.
The freezers are fairly new, but those are really the only fixtures in the store that have been updated recently.
Here's a look at the entrance to the beer department.
And dairy then begins on the back wall of the store, with milk in the back left corner. HABA and nonfoods aisles extend from this area.
I can only assume that all this merchandise -- toys, books, magazines -- will be purged immediately when Food Bazaar comes in. They tend to keep nonfood merchandise to a minimum, although some of their newer stores have larger HABA departments than older ones.
Speaking of, here's a look at Stop & Shop's HABA department. I think it's likely that this will be condensed down to one aisle, although it's possible they'll keep this larger section.
And dairy in the last aisle.
It looks like there is or was a natural food department in the front left corner, with the Selection & Harvest signage for the Nature's Promise department over this area. It looks like the natural grocery shelving has been turned into regular grocery shelving, the natural dairy case is now international dairy, but the natural foods freezers remain.
This store, like most Stop & Shops, has a large HABA department.
This, I believe, used to be the pharmacy. Floral is right next to it...
I don't believe any Food Bazaars have service floral departments, and they tend to be much smaller than this one was. Then again, it had clearly been cut back so much (and didn't appear to be a service counter anymore) that this is probably more similar to Food Bazaar's approach.
And I expect Food Bazaar to greatly increase the meat, seafood, and produce departments here. They tend to be strongest on ingredients like those and beans, grains, and the like. Prepared foods/deli and bakery are not their strong suits, but they've grown into that ability over the last 10 years or so. Certain center-store categories are very minimal, like HABA, and others are present but clearly they don't come naturally, like pet products (although all Food Bazaars have pet foods, it can sometimes be a slightly strange assortment and they are frequently extremely expensive).
A look at the front-end.
And as I was leaving, I noticed this little surprise out back -- a 1980s ACME trailer that had somehow made its way to this store, perhaps by way of C&S Wholesale Grocers or some other distributor...
Opened: ca. 2005
Owner: Ahold Delhaize
Previous Tenants: none; ShopRite previously on property
Future Tenants: Food Bazaar (opening TBD)
Cooperative: none
Location: 240 E Sandford Blvd, Mount Vernon, NY
Photographed: July 12, 2024
This massive store was constructed in roughly 2003-04 and opened in either late 2004 or 2005. It's a pretty typical third-generation Super Stop & Shop, although much larger than most (see Union, which is only 45,000 square feet). It hasn't been renovated since it opened, although sometime after 2008 the logos on the outside were replaced.
This is the type of store that's somewhat sad to see because it's not that old and clearly was, not that long ago, a top store. It would've been beautiful when it opened, but these days is looking a bit dingy. You can see features like the coffee shop in the front corner that are long gone, and it's possible this wood-texture flooring would've originally been a seating area for the coffee shop or something like that. Even a couple years ago, the store was looking really good.
As I mentioned, this store was originally said to be closing this Thursday and switching to Food Bazaar the following day, but we'll see if they stick to that timeline. I'll be back for sure! Here's the other posts for today...
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