Can Downtown Support a Supermarket?

I think Buffalo is there, but it doesn't need to be a Whole Foods or a Trader Joe's, which appeal to a more niche market. Dash's is the way to go.

I recall the reluctance by Wegman's as to building a store in the city. Their store on Amherst street has become one of their most successful.
It seems the best way to go would be to build a superstore near the canal/cobblestone district, that way they could take advantage of the south Buffalo and over the skyway traffic.
Downtown can absolutely support a supermarket and building one would be a great boost to downtown and regions further south.

The best you can hope for...and all you really need is the equivalent of the Tops 1989 Seneca Street Seneca at the corner of Knoerl. It has everything you need for day to day or week to week shopping. But the DT core is not ready for this. It would need about 3,000 more people living downtown to support the cost of doing business down there.

It is a bit of a chicken and egg issue, though. In other cities, when a super market opens in a neighborhood it's commonly an impetus for growth.

The only location for a grocery store would have to be the entire first floor of a parking garage....and should be located within walking distance of a light rail stop.

Therefore, I would agree to the ECC location, Canal District, Main Place Mall.

A grocery store cannot be a light rail only or a cars only feature downtown.

The Walgreens @ Delaware & North is 15K sq. ft. -- a good example of the upper end of the size store that could be supported by the existing downtown population (per the formula cited here).

Other options already in & around DT -- not full-service groceries, by any stretch (high prices, no fresh produced, etc.) -- include the little store at Marine Drive, 3 drug/convenience stores near Lafayette Square, and a corner deli or two. There's also the weekly Buffalo Place farmers' market, and Price Rite nearby in Allentown. Added to the options mentioned in the article, these help fill the gap left by not having a full-service grocery within DT.

Main Place Mall is on Metro Rail and may have enough currently empty space for a small grocery, but that space is on the upper level, the mall is open limited hours, and recent history suggests MP doesn't seem to be interested in anything particularly innovative.

So...I tend to agree with WCP about this. It seems to me it will take more residents, more buildings rehabbed & reoccupied (to eliminate any question in the mind of someone taking a chance on a supermarket that they're locating in a downtown that's on an irreversibly upward path) -- and when the time comes, a critical mass of community leaders and developers to push for a full-service supermarket to locate DT. And by "push" yes, I do mean it will probably take not just some prodding but probably also some subsidies of some sort. DT or not, it's not unusual to have subsidies of some kind to get full-service supermarkets to locate in urban areas these days. Can't see it happening DT without.

Disagree. Office workers will stop in a good downtown super market to shop before heading home (and at lunch time for dry goods). Especially if there is a sale. It's more convenient than making a special trip. Seen it many times. And whole Foods, in particular, has a great spread of prepared foods. However prices are not much cheaper than going to a restaurant.

Aren't there some rumblings of the Lexington Co-op on Elmwood possibly looking for a second location? Something like what they have, maybe slightly bigger, would be the first thing I would look for in downtown.

Now the hard part, getting them to have a second locationd downtown in a location that is easily accessible, with some parking nearby. And finally, how about a location with about 15k-20k square feet, with a potential for small expansion at a later date?

If you look at downtowns and intact urban neighborhood business districts around the world, do they even have "supermarkets"? I think the more typical way that this need is satisfied is to have many smaller grocery stores located in retail storefronts (e.g., Guercio's). A giant warehouse-type supermarket like Wegmans or Tops is not compatible with a dense, pedestrian-scaled landscape.

Last time I was in Toronto, I walked on Bloor Street West from Spadina to several blocks west of Bathurst, and must have passed half a dozen corner grocery stores, with crates of fresh fruit and vegetables displayed on the sidewalks under awnings. There's no need for enormous supermarkets when you have enough smaller grocery stores within walking or transit distance of the residents.

If you build a Trader Joes, they will come. They will come from the suburbs, the city and rural areas.

Trader Joes has a fanatic, cult-like following in Chicago. Build one in downtown Buffalo and it WILL be successful.

If I had my way, I'd do a "lighter quicker cheaper" project on the block between Lafayette Square and Shelton Square (Court St. and Church St.). It would include getting the ground floor of AM&A's open, and buildings on both sides of the street (Main Place Mall, AM&A's, Brisbane) configured for indoor/outdoor shopping at street level -- including fresh fruits & vegetables available DAILY. And of course Newell's coffee cafe at the south end of Main Place Mall. That plus some cheap, colorful banners, awnings, partial weather protection, and even small performance spaces would activate that section of street into a year-round, every-day market block. It would be within a few blocks of almost every DT destination and activity center. It would serve DT dwellers & workers, as well as visitors and MetroRail users. Such a market block could catch on and be there for decades, or it could be a short-term "bridge" until the buildings on that block are redeveloped for other purposes and other DT projects play out (like a market at Canalside, or a full-service, stand-alone supermarket somewhere). It would be relatively cheap to start, cheap to wind down, and almost infinitely flexible and adaptable. It would bring DAILY vibrancy to that block (and not just people walking through on their way from point A to point B) and would not depend on returning cars to that block of Main. But it would also require cooperation between Buffalo Place and the owners of both AM&As and Main Place Mall.

Chances are--?

This comes down to what exactly is "downtown" again? In today's day and age does a modern day grocer need 8800 people within walking distance to their store? Within 5 square miles? What about driving distance? You don't walk home with your groceries...that is unless you need too!

I'm 5 minutes outside of Downtown in the Bryant area and an upscale downtown grocer would be more convenient to me versus Wegman's Amherst Street, --ps. is consistenly one of the busiest Wegman's I've ever seen.

Thats the question..it seems as if someone is missing out. The apartment dwellers downtown...Allentown..Elmwood Village..Delware-Bryant..Albright district..all primarily upscale neighborhoods within minutes of Downtown Buffalo and no full service grocer?

Ontop of 50,000 office workers who would patronize an establishment like this by default..let not pretend it wouldn't be stacked with people getting their groceries before heading home to the burbs and for lunch as well.

Here's the Whole Foods and Superfresh in my South Philly neighborhood, directly next to each other. Both have public parking constructed above which is free to customers and also usable for others patronizing the neighborhood. The stores are full-size supermarkets but are manageable, no need for a megastore. Having said that, I don't think there's the density of people in downtown Buffalo to support a full-service grocery store at this point. The city could incentivize a downtown grocery store but then they would need to be proactive.

http://thejawn.com/uploaded_files/1296175538-DSCF1069.jpg

Whole Foods, you complete me. Trader Joe's, you had me at hello. Whatever happen to buying local 9e.g. Tops, Dash's Wegman's). I thought this was the mantra, did I miss some kool-aide?

WC needs to do a story on downtown Cleveland and the supermarket they added in the Warehouse district a few years ago. Between Warehouse and East 4th street districts, they have a simialr number of housing units. The cleveland supermarket does very well any time i've stopped in it! It carries food and grocery and is like a scaled-down Wegmans in some ways (but with a great wine & cheese selection)!

Info on Constantino's -Cleveland's urban supermarket can be found at: http://www.constantinosmarket.com/

If people in WNY saw this they'd understand to not worry about big national brands but go after putting incentive packages for little guys like this to expand into geographically and demographically similar areas!

What if, instead of one huge store taking up a whole city block, it was divided up into a series of smaller stores that can be opened up and expanded as the market demands? Downtown Raleigh used to be a ghost town 10 years ago, and as people have started re-populating in condos and rehabs, there has been some demand for downtown grocery stores. But just like in Buffalo, not nearly enough for a Whole Foods or Harris Teeter (similar to Wegmans). Instead, one entrepreneur began opening smaller stores which focus on different aspects of the grocery store. http://www.yelp.com/biz/tazs-raleigh-2
You could have one that has beer, cigarettes and convenience items that opens and closes later, and one that has a bakery and fresh produce that opens and close on a more typical grocery store schedule. As the demand grows, expand the stores or open more of them. These stores are easier to fit into the urban grid than a mega-store, and don't require such a huge one-time investment.

my idea or an urban super market is one that you walk to and walk home from, not park your car in an oversized parking lot. Buffalo needs one of them to service the immediate residents in the various downtown neighborhoods

Downtown needs to focus on one area for housing. Lafayette Sqaure is good start. You have the Lafayette, AM&A's Warehouse and soon Department Store, Antonio Lofts, etc. withen walking distance of the Square. A grocery store in the Main Place, former AM&A's department, Main Place Mall (great location is the big empty corner space on Main @ Church) or even in the old Bakers Shoe Store that seems perfect since it is neighbors with CVS and Rite Aid.
Noone is asking for a mega grocery store, the size of the suburban Tops or Wegmans, but a decent place with a wide variety of goods for those who work and live downtown offering fresh food products. We have the Washington Market, but they have limited hours and closed on Sundays. May be a great location is you live a block or two, but not if you live on the southern end of Main St. or need to get food on a Sunday.

You could open a series of businesses that make up a supermarket, and have them work in conjunction with each other.

For instance, a bakery, deli, grocer, and pharmacy all working as one group organization but in separate spaces.

Never underestimate the power of a decent urban market such as Whole Foods (or Joe's or any other) to turn a neighborhood around. Case in point, Washington DC. The mid 14th street corridor (above M st)was desolate. It had never recovered from the urban unrest of the 60's. A few auto repair shops,pawn shops,dollar stores and boarded up buildings. About 10 or 15 years ago The District of Columbia bribed Whole Foods to locate in the neighborhood . In about a 10 year time frame, several thousand new lofts and Condos were built directly across from the whole foods, not to mention the dozens of restaurants. A new neighborhood was born.

How about a totally different chain like Loblaw’s, A&P, Dominion or, better yet, how about a Piggly-Wiggly!
http://www.pigglywiggly.com/about-us

Can we just shut up already about these stupid grocery stores?

A large well managed 7 day week public market @ canalside is better. Fill it with vendors, local and national from bakeries, to butchers, seafood, spices, desserts, coffee roasters, wine & beer, cheese..you get the picture. It is unique, it is a draw and it is several vendors with small overhead compared to a single business taking a huge risk. Let the smaller markets fill in the gaps near loft development. Someone had a cool idea, the CVS at Main & Court would be a nice smaller market.

Well you can assume all you want. Whole Foods did set up in a proverbial wasteland which was burnt out during the riots in the 60's. Like I said they were given substantial incentives. DC is also pursuing this in some pretty bad neighborhoods using Aldi's . Certainly a better policy than letting neighborhoods deteriorate. AFA the snide TIT comment Buffalo does pretty well in the category of govt jobs.

I just wonder if any of you actually work downtown and have ever tried to walk around downtown during the 6 months of winter. If you do, you can't be serious and think downtown workers will walk more than a few blocks to shop and lug bags back to work in 30 mile an hours winds and blowing snow or driving rain. Comparing downtown Buffalo to San Diego, Raleigh, or most any other city especially where it's warmer, is just stupid.

As I look out the window of my Buffknut Megalopolis office, it's dreary, cold, people are all bundled up, and it's dirty and grimy.

And I say this even though I love Buffalo, have lived & worked here all my life, and will never leave.

Publix has a scaled down store in the bottom of my building downtown Orlando.

http://m.progressivegrocer.com/mtop-story-publix-opens-urbanized-unit-in-downtown-orlando-24568.html

I suuggest a supermarket on the ground floor of the Trico Building at Goodel and Washington.
This could be an incredible multi use building now that the medical campus is expanding. UB has committed to moving the medical school downtown and kaleida will soon move women and children's hospital. The building could house labs, a school, housing....you name it. It is on the edge of Allentown, the Medical campus, downtown, the subway, the 33, Main Street and it has parking.
Check out the old Sears wharehouse, a concrete frame building on Jarvis in Toronto that has been converted to housing. The ground floor has a Dominion Supermarket and it sits across from Ryerson University

While downtown itself doesn't have enough residents to support a grocery store, it could easily draw shoppers from other parts of the metro if it was a 'destination' grocery store. Many people from as far away as Amherst, NF or Orchard Park would travel downtown to shop at a Trader Joes or Whole Foods.

Even unconventional food retailers could do well in an area like this. We have been rebuffed many times by Ikea, but they might be interested in opening a limited location that only sells their foodwares (and possibly kitchen supplies, without the furniture department).

On the lower end of the scale, there is a small chain of groceries in VA/MD/PA called Sharp Shopper which basically sells overstock and discontinued items from other retailers (think a TJ Maxx of groceries). Their prices are so low that people travel from miles around to buy there (and their stock always changes, so they often carry entirely different products from week to week. The last time I was at one in VA, they even had Wegmans brands and Upstate Milk products). Their floor plan is much smaller than a traditional supermarket, comparable in size to an Aldi.

The metro area is fairly well saturated with Wegmans and Tops, but bringing in a new chain of either upscale or downscale food stores would fill a niche much larger than just the downtown market. People could easily shop at a Macy's at ANY of the area's shopping malls, but they will gladly drive out of their way to the Galleria or Factory outlet to shop for high end or discount retailers. Food is no different.

http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/blog/alphabet_soup/2011/10/trader-joes-coming-torochester.html
"Trader Joe's coming to ... Rochester
Business First by James Fink, October 14, 2011
… After a very prolonged (almost Bass Pro-like) courtship, Trader Joe's confirmed they will be opening a 14,000-square-foot store in the Pittsford Plaza in suburban Rochester.

The store, which will be Trader Joe's first in Upstate New York, is due to open next summer.

...Retail development logic would almost assume that if Trader Joe's is commited to the Rochester market that Buffalo can't be far behind. … It is also interesting to note that representatives from the Whole Foods supermarket chain have also been giving the Buffalo Niagara region a close look-see in recent months.
… Real estate insiders predict that a scenario could develop — and sooner than many may realize — where Trader Joe's or Whole Foods, or both of them, could set up shop in one of the region's northern suburbs."

Whether in burbs as those insiders predict or the city as some prefer, I'd hope that reporter's comparison to Bass Pro doesn't mean public $ given. I don't see mention of that or tax breaks happening in Rochester, so maybe TJ's doesn't make those demands like Bass Pro does.

As for Wegmans, their website still says they aren't planning new stores in NY state but in Atlantic region states like VA, MD, PA
"You’ll see from our list of future projects that our new store growth is concentrated in the northeast and mid-Atlantic regions, though we will continue to upgrade or replace older stores in our more mature markets, like New York."

Maybe that will change some day, or could we ever get Buffalo annexed somehow to VA or PA?

Most people on this site answered the question of why a store is not opening downtown without even realizing it. Most of us city dwellers go to the Tops on Niagara or the Tops and Wegmans up on Amherst and Elmwood. One post above even added the fact that they are closer to downtown and would frequent a market there as opposed to going to the "uptown" Tops or Wegmans. But we all are going to these stores. Why would a business choose to open another location when they are servicing all us cityfolk already and paying half the employees they would need for a second or third location. It's not that downtown can't support a market, it's that the market is supplying the residents already.

If people keep moving downtown, the "problem" of a lack of a supermarket will solve itself.

I have been saying this for years! Every time i run into somebody i bring it up. Always thought about why Wegmans didnt put one downtown but understand thats too big now but with people living down there now you def need this type of store and a dashes or Trader Joes or Whole Foods would be Perfect...."If you build it, They will come!" =)

Tops Friendly Markets
425 Niagara St (Maryland St), Buffalo, NY 14201

https://img-s.foursquare.com/derived_pix/05PCNUXTO0UIZPRSMI1EFKEFPIXBCMUVFJ5X31WNLNEGLD3D_300x300.jpg

Regularly, BRO bloggers are primarily in an “upscale state of mind.” (Don’t hurt me! It’s OK!)

My vote goes to a commoner-friendly Tops or a Wegmans in the Main Place Mall.

Re: “. . . it's difficult because a downtown location won't have many customers from the east or south to draw from, and there's essentially no west."

The trains and several buses, that stop within a few feet of the Main Place Mall, carry large numbers of eastside, westside and probably southside residents. In addition to the downtown dwellers, they certainly are potential customers.

A substantial number routinely utilize public transportation for part or all of their grocery shopping. An exploratory ride on the Niagara bus which stops at Tops and from the University train station, which is near a Tops, will provide evidence. Some Aldi’s shoppers use the LaSalle station.

Off-subject, but hopefully as an eye-opener -- some years ago, an owner of an athletic shoe store, stated that he made $1 million in the Main Place Mall. That was within the confines of the mall’s abbreviated daytime only hours. (His statement was made during the period that the Main Place Mall’s owners were basically pushing the tenants out [and road-blocking them from locating in the AMA’s building] in their pursuit of making an office complex.)

Just a quick quiz -- Do any of you actually live in the downtown neighborhood? I mean specifically downtown -- from let's Allen to the waterfront, 33 to Niagara Street.

Anyone?

BrianWhite, my hand is up. Yes, I do!

BrianWhite - Allentown area