Our look at Food Bazaar is going to be pretty short today, although as a side update, their proposed store in
Coram, New York has been canceled, apparently because Stop & Shop liquidated all the fixtures in the supermarket prior to Food Bazaar's intended move-in date. We're first returning to the Carlstadt store after my
first visit on day one to check out what they've done. I visited the store on October 20, two weeks after they opened. While the majority of the store looks the same -- no substantial renovation has really started yet -- the natural foods aisle is now fully stocked. In
Piscataway, they didn't seem to be keeping the separated natural foods department that Stop & Shop had; in Carlstadt, it seems like they are, at least for now.
The various international aisles are now fully stocked, too, including this one with Polish, kosher, and Asian food.
And while the Latin American aisle was fully stocked, it's clear they're not done just yet -- my assumption is that pallets of sale items will be placed in the middle of this aisle eventually like
this, in the
Myrtle Avenue store.
The first sign of renovation -- a small one in a store that's going to need much more work -- is that the flooring had begun to be scraped up. All but a few Food Bazaars have polished concrete floor, which is clear they're going for here, too. The tile is being scraped up, starting in the last aisle, and finished. You can see there's clearly other work in progress, too, with the wiring hanging from the ceiling. But you can also see that the temporary decor signage is still up, and when I visited there were no indications any decor changes were starting, nor were any fixtures replaced yet. There are some that definitely need to be replaced or at least refurbished.
Here in the second-to-last aisle, we can see the concrete exposed (but not yet polished, when I took this picture).
Meanwhile, in the last aisle, the flooring is all done. Because the building isn't that old and hasn't had that much change to its flooring over the years, the concrete underneath is in really good shape.
One final observation: new self-checkouts had been installed, but weren't yet active. There were four added on the front-end near where the pharmacy used to be.
Now from New Jersey, we move over to Queens, where a store in Jackson Heights is now...
...a big hole in the ground. The
Food Bazaar that once stood here -- Food Bazaar's second location, and a former Finast that was later a Pioneer -- has been demolished. The property is soon to become a
new mixed-use development, with 45,000 square feet of ground-floor retail going to a brand-new Food Bazaar. The previous store was around 20,000 square feet. The Myrtle Avenue store, which I linked above, is a similar situation where a store around 15,000 square feet was demolished for a multi-story mixed use development with a 40,000 square foot Food Bazaar at the bottom.
Here's a look at the now-demolished supermarket...
Food Bazaar also
has a store about two blocks south at 35-60 Junction Blvd (this one is at 34-20 Junction). When this store closed, that store got a renovation and an expansion to its current size, about 28,000 square feet. It also got a
tiny parking lot in the back corner. That's all for Food Bazaar for now, and here's the other stores we're checking out this weekend:
Coram was canceled due to a proposed rent increase by the landlord. It’s probably in their best interest. But I bet this space will be empty for years to come. Another high theft area. Ask anyone at the Home Depot also.
ReplyDeleteOh, thanks for the information.
DeleteI strongly doubt high theft would've deterred Food Bazaar; they've long operated large stores in traditionally high-theft locations in New York City and the immediate suburbs. They seem a bit better-equipped to deal with that than many bigger chain supermarkets, like Stop & Shop.