Brother's Supermarket - Roslindale, MA

Brother's Supermarket
Opened: 2023

Owner: Ambiris Fernandez

Previous Tenants: Baby Nat's Fruitland (1970s-2023)

Cooperative: none

Location: 606 American Legion Hwy, Roslindale, MA

Photographed: July 6, 2024

In 2023, the owner of longtime produce market Baby Nat's Fruitland retired, selling her business to a local chain of small grocery stores called Brother's Supermarket. Brother's has three very small supermarkets in Dorchester (and briefly also owned a store in Randolph, a Boston suburb, that has since become an America's Food Basket). Brother's remodeled the store's interior -- the exterior seems still yet to receive the promised redo -- and turned the store into a full supermarket, rather than the mostly-produce slant of Baby Nat's.

Brother's did a lot of work on the inside while, I believe, keeping the store open, including new flooring, fixtures, and lighting. It's still a very small store -- only around 7000 square feet -- but now functions as a more complete supermarket. Produce is at the back of the building, with meat, dairy, and deli on the left side wall, and frozen on the front wall facing American Legion Highway. The entrance and exit are on Canterbury Street.

It's a bit difficult to orient yourself looking at these pictures compared to the Baby Nat's pictures, since the store is set up so differently. But below, we're looking at approximately the same angle as this (you can see the walls to the right -- the back wall of the building -- and left in roughly the same place).

As you can tell, all of the fixtures were new when Brother's moved in.

There are only a few grocery aisles and they're very short given the small size of the store overall, but there's roughly a full grocery selection here.

And Brother's has installed a large butcher department in the back-left corner, along with a very small deli next to it.

The freezer cases here line the front wall of the building, which is angled along American Legion Highway.

Brother's uses Best Yet storebrand items from C&S, but isn't a member of a cooperative.

Rice & Beans, the only department in the store to get a named sign, is on the front wall beyond the registers.

It's really interesting to see what Brother's has done with the space, and how efficiently they've used what limited space they have. Their other three stores are quite small too. (Incidentally, this is unrelated to the Brothers Marketplace chain of gourmet markets, which is a Roche Brothers brand and owned by wholesaler Bozzuto's.)

Tomorrow, we're headed a couple blocks northwest to check out a building I suspect once housed a grocery store.