Star Market
Opened: unknown; expanded 1994-95
With all that general history, I must admit: I don't know too much detail about this specific location's history. It was constructed in the mid- to late-1960s, then expanded around the mid-90s to its current size and appearance. It seems like it opened under the Star Market brand, and I don't actually think it ever operated as a Shaw's despite the fact that interior signage carried the Shaw's brand for years. The store was renovated in late 2019 through early 2020. Notice that the exterior actually, at the time of my 2019 visit, still had the ca. 1990s Star Market logo. When Shaw's and Star Market came under the same ownership, the logo was modified to the current logo in the same font as Shaw's, which you can see in the first picture.
So we'll tour the roughly 62,000 square foot store extensively, with pictures both before and after the renovation. Also note the Walgreens to the right, which possibly was originally part of the supermarket -- it could have been an Osco pharmacy, for instance, when Jewel owned Star, especially given that from the facade, it looks like the whole space was originally one store.
This 90s-era logo was also still proudly displayed on a sign out by the street until the remodel.
The exterior got just a little bit of work in the remodel, with a fresh coat of paint and a new sign. I can't explain the off-center old sign. There are so many things about this store that I don't understand, so hopefully a local can explain it more!
The store is looking quite good after its refresh, although I question the dark blue lettering on the dark green facade.
And while there aren't that many benefits to waiting six years to post pictures, one of them is that we can, in some cases, see a before-and-after like this.
What's intriguing is that this store has a nearly identical layout to ACMEs of the 1990s, and remember that at (approximately) the time it was remodeled and expanded, it was owned by ACME's parent company American Stores. You enter to the produce department in the front-left corner, with bakery in the rest of the first aisle. Meat lines most of the back wall, with an alcove on the right side of the back wall for service seafood and deli counters. Dairy, frozen, and HABA are on the right side, although there's no pharmacy (which again makes me think the neighboring drugstore was originally part of the supermarket).
The remodel brought the standard Star Market decor package, which we'll get very familiar with as we tour stores in the Boston area. One Star Market uses the so-called Ultra Premium decor package, developed for higher-end Pavilions stores on the west coast. It seems that these days, Albertsons Companies is positioning Star Market as the more urban chain that's just a slight step more upscale than Shaw's, which tends to be mainstream and suburban.
In the remodel, the produce department was extended into the first aisle, encroaching on the bakery's territory a little bit. I'm not totally sure why, but this store was very light on the decor before the renovation, and is still very limited decor-wise.
Despite the relatively little work done to the decor in the remodel, it does look like a lot of the fixtures were updated in the remodel.
When I visited in 2019, the Shop the World international foods department had been reset out, and in a... questionable move, the aisle markers remained with handwritten categories.
You can see the wood-texture flooring where the natural foods department previously was, too. As an interesting aside, the Wild Harvest natural and organic brand originated here at Star Market, and was later brought to the other American Stores brands. It stayed with Supervalu, which recently redesigned the brand identity, and now the Albertsons chains use the O Organics brand that originated with Safeway.
New flooring around the perimeter, along with new fixtures in a lot of the departments.
On the right side of the back wall, we have the deli and seafood departments. You can see the tiny department signs above the service counters here.
I suppose you are limited by the low ceiling around the perimeter, but it seems like Star Market could've gotten more creative for the department signage.
At least it's clear and bold now! All new fixtures in these departments.
No changes other than some paint in the frozen aisles, though.
One of the Shaw's logos around the store...
Sadly, all of the Wellbeing signage has been removed. I really liked that branding.
And we finally get the big, bold signage this decor package typically uses in the last aisle, which has dairy cases on the outside.
And once again, we have Shaw's branding in the dairy department! All of the Shaw's logos were removed in the 2019-2020 renovation.
New fixtures, too, here in the dairy department.
Floral in an island on the right side of the store.
There were a few odd alcoves in this part of the store, which is in the front-right corner. Again, that makes me think the layout was modified in some way after the initial construction, and my best guess is that in this corner the supermarket somehow connected to the drugstore next door.
The good news is, though, that all of those weird corners had been streamlined in the latest renovation. A Starbucks counter has also been added to this corner, making better use of the space. I think the grocery aisles were also extended into this corner farther than they were.
The floral department was also moved out of this corner in the remodel, and if I remember correctly, it was moved next to the entrance on the other side facing the produce department.
A look across the front-end before the renovation...
And although all the Shaw's branding was removed from the store in the recent remodel, there was still one sign remaining, which I spotted in the men's room...
Opened: unknown; expanded 1994-95
Owner: Albertsons Companies
Previous Tenants: unknown
Cooperative: none
Location: 130 Granite St, Quincy, MA
Photographed: August 4, 2019 and May 6, 2023
Welcome to the very first Star Market here on The Market Report! Star Market is one of those chains with a little bit of a difficult history to summarize. So I'd highly recommend taking a look at this Wikipedia article, which clearly describes the many sales and acquisitions. Basically, the store started with one location in Watertown, MA, to the northwest of Boston, then grew to a chain eventually acquired by Jewel, the Chicago supermarket chain. And American Stores -- ACME -- acquired Jewel, thus also acquiring Star Market. Then American Stores sold Star Market to an investment firm, which in turn sold the chain to Sainsbury's, the British supermarket chain that also owned Shaw's, in 1999. Albertsons bought Sainsbury's American holdings in 2004, then Supervalu bought a majority of Albertsons' retail operations in 2006, and Supervalu spun off the Albertsons retail operations in 2014. The relevant part is that Shaw's and Star Market have been owned by the same company since 1999, and up until roughly the Supervalu acquisition, Albertsons was focused on converting Star Markets to Shaw's. But in 2008, they reversed course, switching Boston-area Shaw's back to Star Market. That even included some stores that were never Star Markets originally. I haven't photographed all of the 21 Star Markets currently in operation, but we will see nearly all of them, so we'll see a lot more about the chain soon enough.
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This is a particularly simple version of this decor package, which as we'll see can be just a paint job and some new letters, like we see here, or it can be a very high-end, beautiful interior.
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This store had the Shaw's decor package of the early 00s prior to its 2019-2020 remodel, complete with Shaw's leaves and even the Shaw's name in a few places, even though I don't believe this store was ever a Shaw's. From 2007 to the present, at least, it's been a Star Market. Plus, why would all the signage outside have been in the 90s style if it briefly switched to Shaw's in the early 00s? I have to assume that, if the store was rebranded, they didn't keep the old Star Market signage hanging around.
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Sushi and cheese in the back-right corner of the store. You can tell this is an older layout because these specialty departments are tucked away in a back corner of the store rather than front and center.
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One more interesting tidbit. What happens to be just three blocks from this store? The Stop & Shop corporate headquarters, right in Quincy Center. There's a Stop & Shop very close, too, which we'll be seeing on Monday. But before we leave the area entirely, there's actually another very small grocer in this strip mall. Check out Mignosa's here, and have a great weekend!
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