Kings Food Markets
Opened: by 1964
Remember the Livingston Kings? You might recall my posts from their transition, after Albertsons Companies acquired the chain in 2020-2021 (scrolling through my posts tagged Livingston will show you many of those posts from 2020-2022). The Livingston Kings was expanded significantly in a ca. 2012 remodel, moving the deli, bakery, and prepared foods departments (and the registers) into a row of neighboring storefronts. On the far left side of the store was originally a cafe and coffee shop, along with some prepared foods and baked goods. Shortly after the renovation was complete, that area was walled off for a liquor store. When Albertsons Companies took over, the cafe was removed, too, and customer service moved into that corner. The liquor store became a kosher department in 2022, and the store held a grand reopening (even though nothing else in the store had changed, really). Within the last few weeks, the kosher department has been removed again, and the corner is now home to the floral department.
I was tipped off that something was going on because I noticed a dumpster and some lift trucks outside. Sadly, this dumpster had nothing too interesting inside, just an old wooden shelf display unit.
Here you can see the corner where the kosher foods previously were (here's an overview), with greeting cards blocking off the main section where some construction materials were stored. This first round of pictures is from a visit on 6/28.
It looks like the shelving here was the gondolas previously used for the kosher aisles, and since all these fixtures were so new anyway I'm sure they just packed them up and sent them to another store. You can also see below that all the beiges don't quite match, but they're pretty close.
I returned on July 1 and the new corner was already essentially finished. Where obvious work was still going on, though, was in the corner just next to the entrance -- where floral previously was. These construction materials were temporarily held there.
And a new produce island was also in this area, possibly suggesting the corner will become part of the produce department, too. I haven't been back since to see what else has happened.
When ACI took over this store, they reduced the produce department, which previously had refrigerators lining both sides of the first aisle and islands in the middle. They replaced the islands but removed the refrigeration on the left side. It's now just grocery shelving.
Over in the second-to-last grocery aisle, the candy has been removed, as it's now next to the floral department. Packaged kosher foods are now in this area, although they don't seem to be carrying the pretty extensive selection of refrigerated and frozen kosher foods they previously did.
I don't fully know the reason for this change, although I would guess that they simply weren't selling enough kosher foods and needed to reduce the selection. I'm fairly certain that the selection was cut back during this switch.
But floral is a natural choice to put in this corner, and candy and greeting cards have also been relocated here. They didn't really install any decor (beyond hanging a few posters) when this became kosher foods, so there wasn't really anything to remove. This store still sports its ca. 2012 decor, which is generally in good shape but looking somewhat dated by now.
We'll have to see what comes next for the former floral department, but for now, this seems like a logical shift for the store's layout, especially considering this is a fairly low-volume store. It's also on the smaller side, at around 26,000 square feet. That's all for Kings, but check out this weekend's other posts here!
Opened: by 1964
Owner: Albertsons Companies
Previous Tenants: none
Cooperative: none
Location: 255 S Livingston Ave, NJ
Photographed: June 28 and July 1, 2025
- Lincoln Market's stunning latest store in central Brooklyn
- The completed renovations at Brooklyn and Central Jersey SuperFresh stores
- Some more work ongoing at a North Jersey Kings (this post)
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