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Special Report: LIDL - Brooklyn, NY (Gateway)

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By Zachary
LIDL
Opened: January 29, 2025
Owner: The Schwarz Group
Previous Tenants: Michaels
Cooperative: none
Location: 459 Gateway Dr, East New York, Brooklyn, NY
Photographed: March 21, 2025
Welcome to the largest strip mall in New York City, the Gateway Center! Located way out in East New York, Brooklyn -- for out-of-towners, that's ten miles southeast of Times Square, which may as well be a different country -- the mall spans nearly 90 acres, which is absolutely enormous but especially large for New York City. And the mall is home to three supermarkets -- a ShopRite, an ALDI, and this brand-new LIDL in a recently-closed Michaels.
At around 40,000 square feet, it's much larger than the 16,000 square foot ALDI but less than half the size of the 90,000+ square foot ShopRite, which is New York City's largest supermarket. By my calculations, the second-largest supermarket in the city is up in the Bronx and the third-largest is in Queens. Both are Food Bazaars, at 83,000 square feet and 75,000 square feet, respectively. I'm fairly certain that the fourth-largest is a ShopRite on Staten Island, at around 70,000 square feet, but I don't know for sure. There's only a relatively short list of stores in the famously crowded city above 65,000 square feet.
This LIDL also seems to attract a bit more business than the ALDI, probably proportional to their respective sizes. As I've mentioned before, LIDL's complete 180 in operations since they first entered the US is stunning, and they're now easily the best-run discount supermarket chain in the US, at least in my opinion. The ALDI here at the Gateway Center is pretty new, too, so it's nice enough, but it was messy and felt a little dingy. This LIDL was much more appealing.
Produce is in the front-left corner of the store, with deli items and bakery in the first aisle on the left side. Meat and seafood are in the back-left corner, with dairy on the back wall and frozen on the right side in the last aisle.
The store is deep and narrow, so the MIDL of LIDL section here is actually more like the back of LIDL. But that's not all that catchy.
Looking across the back wall. Notice that this LIDL sells beer, which I don't typically see -- but I usually only go to their stores in New Jersey, where supermarkets don't sell beer. In fact, supermarkets in New York might sell wine soon.
Frozen and dairy in the last aisle. It goes without saying that all of the fixtures here are brand-new.
And a look at the front-end, with self checkouts on the left side and a few staffed registers. The ALDI here at the Gateway Center doesn't have self-checkouts.
And that's all for this LIDL! This is the only location currently operating in Brooklyn, but several more are in progress in the borough, including Crown Heights and Park Slope. Before those, though, check out this weekend's other posts!
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