Whole Foods Market has signed a lease at Chappaqua Crossing to open a 40,000-square-foot supermarket in a proposed retail development on the former Reader”™s Digest Association property. It would be the natural and organic food company”™s fourth store in Westchester County.
Whole Foods executives announced the lease deal Tuesday during the Austin, Texas-based company”™s quarterly earnings call, according to a spokesman for Chappaqua Crossing”™s Connecticut owners, Summit/Greenfield Partners.
Summit/Greenfield in April submitted revised plans to the town of New Castle for a “retail village” with 120,000 square feet of store space on the southern side of the 120-acre campus. Whole Foods would anchor the development in a freestanding 50,000-square-foot building.
In a nearly decade-long and at times litigious town review process, Summit/Greenfield has received preliminary approvals to build 111 townhouse and condominium units on the site. The owner also leases more than 600,000 square feet of office space in the former Reader”™s Digest headquarters complex.
Summit/Greenfield officials said they expect zoning amendments and site plans to be approved from the town later this year, after which construction of the grocery store would begin.
Felix Charney, president of Summit Development L.L.C. in Southport, Conn., said he and his joint venture partners “are delighted to have Whole Foods Market coming to Chappaqua Crossing. ”¦ There has been a great deal of interest in Chappaqua Crossing on the part of many prominent grocers but we believe Whole Foods Market is the perfect fit for Chappaqua and the entire New Castle community.”
In addition to Whole Foods, the campus retail development would include 80,000 square feet of space in six buildings. Charney said Summit/Greenfield expects to announce a fitness facility as one tenant.
Whole Foods operates stores in White Plains, Port Chester and Yonkers and has six locations in southern Connecticut. It operates approximately 375 stores in the U.S., Canada and the United Kingdom.
