My loved grocery market closed. Heard word yesterday that all 13 Fairway markets may close. The most loved NYC market. NYtimes story this morning says it may be true but denied by a spokesperson for the chain.

I have to travel a bit further for another. I'm stopping at HMart more often and may try WholeFoods again...just not convenient. My crappy Stop-n-Shop looks like it may go under. (not surprised)

Amazon Strikes Again.

Oh Sleevendog I was heartbroken hearing about that last night! Stop and Shop is taking over Long Island so I doubt that will go anywhere soon. Whole Foods, and H Mart across the way from that, I’ve also got Latin markets, not to mention a couple Trader Joe’s, all pretty close. Oh and we have Wild by Nature but I think Stop and Shop might own them now, plus one good old independent whose second location failed but I’d have to believe has enough loyal customers to keep the original going. And a couple Shop Rites. Uncle Giuseppe’s might get more visits from me... I recall a few years ago finding something ridiculous like 13 bonafide supermarkets within 5 miles of me, but none would fill the void of losing Fairway. A Wegman’s would help a bit. Hope they see an opportunity. Fairway is a popular store, they must have REALLY screwed something up to ruin it.

But back to big box stores, yeah we lost our BB&B also. There are two more within a few miles of me, but one is terrible and the other only good. I was only half sad about that; I really hate their model of up-charging in order to make those with coupons feel like they got a deal, or ripping off those without. For me Amazon pretty much replaced them, though I do value ability to see and feel before purchasing.

Williams Sonoma recently left our mall. That was quite disappointing. There are more around, but a bit of a drive. And if I’m driving a bit I’m more likely to go to Sur La Table.

There was a lower end kitchen store at all the local outlets that I’m now not seeing on the maps. Cook’s something or Chef’s something. Maybe they’re gone.

Answer to your question, yes I’m seeing it.

(I just went to wegmans.com to tell them to come to Long Island. They actually have a drop-down option to request a new location - so I did!)

Another article says the city stores are doing great as always but they are struggling to cary the problems at the RedHook, Stanford, NJ Fairway markets. Mine closed in October. No mention of that.

BBB in the city is always packed. My local one is always empty if it is still there.

Our mom and pop Italian market has renovated. (Fweew). Always packed, great true butcher. They took over an old A&P. Small freezer section along a side wall. No Dole Kraft, or Campbells beasts/bullies.

SurLaTab is always empty but the Chef (Supply?) is popular. Cooking classes, knife sharpening....chef quality supplies geared toward the home cook.

My local BBB never has anything in stock. I have had to order everything I bought from them over the past year. However, that is true of almost everything I purchased. BBB, Walmart, Target, Home Depot, and Lowes. No one had it in the store. You had to order and then return if it didn't work, or the color was off.

As far as groceries, I don't order online, but I am up to six different stores now to get the items I like.

ETA: Six different grocery stores. Publix, Walmart, Target, Kroger, Whole Foods, and Star Market. We also have an Earth Touch, Aldi, and Fresh Market, but I haven't used them yet. I do have to go to 3 Walmarts and 2 Publix from time to time.

My fear is that our BBB store will close and I shop there for a variety of things

Carlton Cards is closing all their stores within 6 weeks and will only be available online.

The big problem as I see it is that these stores are run on biz school models which were always short sighted (not geared toward longevity) and now out of date. Throughout retail there is also a fad of reducing inventory, especiakly on variety of product, to increase profitability, whether it's restaurant menus, or a kitchen store with only one kind of peeler and no pastry blenders. Making people order what they need, when they want to just pick it up and look at it and take it home is self defeating. Unfortunately, retail got burned by people looking in the store then ordering online from businesses that had less overhead and passed that savings through their pricing.

I rarely go into BBB. It's unpleasant and I hate the coupon game. I doubt the one near me will close before the chain goes under. They look like they're full of variety, but it's mostly repetition.

5-10 yrs ago I had a hard time with the carbon footprint of shipping...UPS and FedX...not so today. They are here everyday. Two trucks, not 50-100 cars frustrated in and out of parking lots. Maybe I'm just excusing myself from involving/recognizing the bad. Well too bad, my time is valuable. Pissed how the days fly by in these elder years. : ). Our needs are pretty basic. Keeping it simple.

I’m surprised that BBB has lasted as long as it has. I have never been a fan.

Not a big box, but it was announced this week that 20 (of 21) Lucky’s Markets in Florida were closing by mid February. (Total nationwide closing is 32.)

Article

Not kitchen related, but Pier 1 is also closing stores.

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — Pier 1 Imports is closing nearly half its 942 stores as it struggles to draw consumers and compete online. The home decor company said it is closing up to 450 stores and will also shutter distribution centers.

More chains closing in 2020:

https://moneywise.com/a/chains-closing-the-most-stores-in-2020

We usually go to NYC a couple times a year, but hadn't been for awhile. First place that I head to is Sur la Table in SoHo. Gone.

food chains are next ... everything will be Taco Bell in time (what was the name of that sly movie?) ... oh yeah, and shells in the bathroom

None of the stores on the list make me nearly as sad as I was the day that Woolworth's closed. As newlyweds with not much at our disposal we pretty adequately got all we needed to have a working kitchen from them. And I loved their diner counter too.

It's all so sad. Our local BB&B is being replaced by a City Target. It's not the end of the world because there are plenty of others within 6-12 miles. I like their Harmon Face Values store. We have one in West LA and they accept the BBB coupons and their shelf prices are (were) really good too. Definitely better than CVS!! Our Ralph's Market (Kroger owned) is closing after 20 years. Their lease was up for renewal and Rick Caruso who owns the Grove and other large shopping centers (ours is small) jacked the rent big time. Rumor has it that an Amazon Market is coming in. We shall see. There's already one about 8 miles away that should be opening soon in a former ToysRUs location. They say that that one will be staffed, not self serve. I'll keep you posted.

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Oh, Edie, me too! There was a big one in downtown Omaha that was right on the corner of our bus stop. I spent way too much time in that store... and at the lunch counter. ;-)

I try to buy local but I live in a small town and sometimes my choices are drive to the city and hope that they have it or go to Amazon. Shopping Amazon saves me $25 in gas and I'm not even sure that the store in the city will have it BECAUSE so many retailers have reduced inventory tremendously. It is sad to see such a reduced inventory as so many retailers but even sadder when they close.

I was really distressed to learn yesterday that Lucky's Market is closing 24 of its 25 stores in Florida. Rats! I grew to really like Lucky's because you could count on its fresh, local produce.

Once online retailers figured out the shipping part of the transaction (free and fast), all bets were off for local brick and mortar stores. I never saw such empty stores at Christmas time before - it was the night of the living dead in some of the stores. In some ways we are going back to an earlier model of shopping where people did buy things from catalogs (Sears, MW). What has changed is that its faster (and online). Go figure.

Future is here.

Trader Joe's, you will be history soon.

dcarch

Yes, we had a local Star Market, that was fantastic. Super fresh meat and seafood departments. Unfortunately, they over expanded, the original owner died, and they went back to the first store, which is not as good as it was before the expansion started.

I have not been to any Trader Joe's that was not crowded, and so the ones here are doing a booming business.

The BB&B in my neighborhood (Westchester) seems to be doing okay, and there is usually a line to check out, but not too long. I prefer to buy things there rather than have them delivered because I don't like receiving deliveries when I'm not here, and sometimes I cannot exactly predict when the delivery will arrive, or else I want something and will be leaving town in a couple of days. It is also getting tiresome having to recycle all the Amazon boxes.

Trader Joe's isn't going anywhere. I shop there at least once a week, but refuse to shop on Sundays. It's pure madness!

Dcarch was making a joke comparing TJ's to Amazon's peopleless stores. Anyone who has shopped at Trader Joe's knows it's not going anywhere. They put people first, both employees and customers, and they deliver on what they say and don't try to be what they aren't. Simple model for a thriving business: Integrity and pleasantness.

Given what I've seen about the Amazon stores and what's happened to Whole Foods under their stewardship, they want to commoditize food and make it as widgity as possibly, and remove as much human interaction as possible out of the equation. It's a bad, bad approach to food.

I thought it was a funny joke, though. :)

Amazon can overwhelm Trader Joe's in two minutes, but they would not for now. That would be bad publicity.

They have already destroyed many local small shops, and many shopping malls and many other businesses.

dcarch

Here we never had a BBB, and I have Walmart, Meijer and Aldi for grocery stores. One small JCPenney for clothing and one shoe store. No Target either.

Like Martha, I can drive to the city, but Grand Rapids is 50 miles away, so that's 100 miles round trip. I don't get groceries from Amazon. Yet....

Grand Rapids does have a Sur La Table, and the Williams Sonoma just moved to a new store. No BBBs in Michigan are scheduled to close,, and the Pier One is still there too.

Grand Rapids also has Costco, Sam's Club, Trader Joe's, Fresh Thyme. No Whole Foods within two hours. Sadly, G.B. Russo's closed, they were an independent Italian grocery, one of AnnT's favorites and the destination of a couple of Cooking Forum outings. (sigh)

So, if I really want something out of the very ordinary I drive to Grand Rapids, but more likely I'll check Amazon.

Annie

Well, it's not really Amazon that's killing stores. It's the convenience of online shopping converging with people being on the 'net 24/7 with their mobile devices. Think, I need a 3/8" Phillips head screwdriver, and instead of making a note and setting a reminder to look at the note, so that tomorrow you remember to stop at the hardware store, with an extra 10 minutes to park, only to find that you can either buy a set of screwdrivers, a set of screw bits, or individual metric screwdrivers at that store because there's not so much demand for American when people are using them on imported goods, you just look it up on Amazon Prime, decide that the price is good, tap a couple of buttons and it shows up tomorrow.

Perishables are different. At Whole Foods, Amazon is selling a lot of vegetables in packets that you can't break up (at Ralphs, a Kroger owned chain, if you don't want the whole packet you can usually just open it and take what you want). Additionally, the packets usually have some rotten ones and the quantity in the packets is too big. (TJ's, who do sell a lot of packets, have more appropriate portions, better prices, and while the whole bag may go off too quickly (which they refund no questions asked), if you look though the clear part, you can see what's up. They don't hide a number of not good pieces in with the fresh ones to "eliminate food waste" like Amazon does. At Whole Foods, nowadays, I don't dare buy a prepared salad. They shove the trimmings in, the stems, and the thick hard inedible spines of the leafys (I'm not talking Romain spines, but quarter inch thick fibrous, only good for stock pot and not really even good for that, most closely compared to a cross between strand board and carpet backing). This is in the grab and go entree salads from the produce department. So, you've grabbed and gone so aren't there to complain and demand recompense. Great little racket they have. Their trash gets thrown away at someone else's location so they can claim to have less waste.

Tomatoes aren't indistinguishable. I don't buy tomatoes at TJ's because they over-chill them and they have no flavor. But I can buy tomatoes anywhere and find lovely ones. I want to choose my own!! Not have some company box them up with rot!! I want a firmer one for slicing, and a riper one for guacamole and a fragrant one for a salad. And I want the nice man with the big smile and long apron to help me find a melon that's nearly ripe off season. Amazon has gotten rid of all the smiles in the produce department. They give the workers time quotas for accomplishing tasks that remind me of the old parable about how Pharoah tricked the Israelite slaves into working ever harder and faster making bricks. These quotas don't allow for chatting with the customers, helping them find things, etc. The same people at WF who used to be happy and nice all seem grumpy and harried now. At TJ's they try hard to keep their employees happy. Many start singing while they're working (not performing, just forgetting themselves and being happy). All are friendly and eager to help because that's a big focus of their training.

I can deal without the humans buying a screwdriver, or even canned tomato puree which most stores here don't even carry anymore. But for actual, real, fresh food, I want real people selling it.

Maybe Amazon can indeed crush TJ's. But I doubt it. At least, maybe they could by imitating the good points of TJ's and getting rid of a lot of their bads, but I think the corporate culture there think like robots not people, and they don't understand that part.