Wegmans, among the most respected supermarket companies in the country, is rumored to have recently considered Westchester County as a potential location for expansion, according to commercial real estate brokers ”“ but a company spokeswoman denied any such plans.
Long dominant in upstate New York where it is based, Wegman”™s has expanded the past five years to the mid-Atlantic region, a hotly contested area for chains due to continued growth in Virginia and North Carolina. The company is also expanding into New England next year, with two stores planned for the Boston suburban market.
For now, the company has no similar plans for Connecticut, Fairfield County, Westchester or other New York City area locales, according to Jo Natale, a Wegmans spokeswoman in Rochester.
Natale said rumors often surface of a Wegmans entry into the metropolitan New York City market, but said it is not the focus of the company”™s expansion plans at present.
“We can only open two or three stores a year,” Natale said. “We certainly go where the people are; it”™s a case where we can only manage so many sites over a period of time.”
Â
A Westchester market would obviously make more possible a foray into Fairfield County, which has seen its own fair share of action in the past year. No sooner did Shaw”™s announce it would leave its Post Road East location in Westport, than Greensboro, N.C.-based Fresh Market Inc. said it would take over the space as the front echelon of an expansion into New England, along with a site in Massachusetts. That store is now open, providing a different look for shoppers with bins of produce and other products.
Â
The popular New York City chain Fairway Group Holdings Corp. is completing a location in the Harbor Point development in Stamford”™s South End, despite developer Building & Land Technology L.L.C. having yet to start 4,000 units of planned housing there.
In Darien, a Whole Foods is being built at a prime location just off Interstate 95 and adjacent to the town”™s rail station. On Main Street in Bridgeport just south of the Merritt Parkway, PriceRite is opening in a location formerly occupied by Pathmark. And in Westchester County, ShopRite Supermarkets inked a lease for a new store in downtown White Plains. Another Westchester ShopRite in New Rochelle opened last month.
Locally owned stores have also been expansion minded ”“ Stew Leonard”™s Inc. was rebuffed by a small group of Orange residents in its attempt to build a store there, but the company continues to assess opportunities for a new location. Caraluzzi”™s, meanwhile, opened a third store in Newtown to complement locations in Redding and Bethel, across the street from a Big Y store.
The recent proliferation of new supermarkets is remarkable given the recession”™s impact on credit for companies looking to expand, and given Fairfield County”™s population trends, which remain flat compared with most other parts of the country.
Countering those trends, however, is the remarkable wealth the region accumulated in the most recent economic cycle, and the fact that the recession has been comparatively mild here compared with other parts of the nation.
Traditional supermarkets are also attempting to co-opt some of “back to the earth” themes of Whole Foods and other grocers marketing themselves on green, organic lines. This month, Scarborough, Maine-based Hannaford Brothers announced a “Keep Local Farms” initiative to raise funds for Northeast dairy farmers. The Delhaize-owned company does not have stores in Connecticut.
