Fine Fare Supermarkets - Manhattan, NY (Harlem/145th)

Fine Fare Supermarkets

Opened: 2010

Owner: Rudy Fuertes

Previous Tenants: Pioneer (closed 2007)

Cooperative: Retail Grocers Group

Location: 2497 Adam Clayton Powell Jr Blvd, Manhattan, NY

Photographed: January 9, 2020 and August 2, 2021

The former Roosevelt Theater was at some point converted to a Pioneer Supermarket, which closed in 2007 before being opened as a Fine Fare in 2010. It's around 15,000 square feet, so on the bigger side for Harlem, but competes with a much larger Pathmark-turned-Foodtown a block west.

Rudy Fuertes, who also owns a handful of other Fine Fare locations in the Bronx and Manhattan, owns this store. It looks like Pioneer was under different ownership. Don't forget to say hi to Teddy Roosevelt, whose bust remains on the storefront as a relic from the Roosevelt Theater days.

You enter on the left side of the store to produce in the first aisle. Meat lines the back wall, with frozen in the second-to-last aisle and dairy in the last aisle. Deli is in the front-right corner. The store is small and feels somewhat cramped, but the biggest limitation is definitely the unusually low ceiling around the perimeter. There's a portion in the middle with a higher ceiling. Those varying ceiling heights are almost certainly because of the building's history as a theater. I don't know exactly how it would've been set up, but you can see more about the theater's history here.

Cold cuts are also here in the first aisle.

In the grocery aisles, the first thing you'll notice is probably the precision with which the shelves are stocked. When I visited, there was hardly a single item out of place anywhere in the store.

You can see a couple generations of decor here, too. The cartoony meats and frozen signage is older, while the black-and-white historical photos, the aisle markers, and the Harlem City Deli signage are from a newer decor package. It's possible some of the older decor is left over from Pioneer, but I don't know.

The fixtures seem relatively new, including these freezers and the refrigeration.

Again, some of the unusual corners and big columns are probably a relic of the past use of the building. I don't know, but I would doubt Pioneer's layout was significantly different from Fine Fare's.

This is one of many supermarkets in converted theaters in New York City and elsewhere, but one of the most surprising examples (since closed and demolished) was another Fine Fare down in Philadelphia. Check it out and see some stunning interior pictures here and here.

This post was rewritten on July 6, 2026 with new photos.