ShopRite of Pelham Parkway
Opened: 2022
Welcome to the ShopRite of Pelham Parkway, a Village Super Market-owned store that I haven't posted previously! This 75,000 square foot supermarket is carved out of a former department store, which was originally a Korvette's and later a Caldor, then Kmart. Fairway Market was the original grocery tenant here, opening up in this extensively-renovated building in 2009. In 2020, Fairway declared bankruptcy, and Village and Food Bazaar both bid on this location, with Village ultimately winning this along with four Manhattan stores and a warehouse. (Incidentally, Food Bazaar has a store not far away in Mount Vernon, and attempted to purchase a second in a deal that fell through for reasons that haven't been made public. That former Stop & Shop is now soon to open as a Floor & Decor.)
Village operated the store briefly as a Fairway, but shortly after acquiring the location began converting it to a ShopRite. The official grand reopening was in October 2022 after an extensive renovation.
I've been to this store twice, once back in July of 2024 and again at the end of last month. Given the unusual -- and Fairway-centric -- goings-on at several Village Super Market stores, I had to come back to check it out. If they were removing Fairway brands from New Jersey ShopRites, what would they be doing in a converted Fairway that, notably, retained several of its signature Fairway features during the conversion to ShopRite? A Fairway Wine & Spirits store is located just next door to the supermarket, and the main sign was switched to just Wine & Spirits during the ShopRite conversion. Fairway branding remains on several smaller signs, though, including a large wall sign just inside the store that I wasn't able to get a picture of. Inside the supermarket, though, it's a different story.
We start here with a sign inside the supermarket encouraging customers to go visit the wine & spirits store next door -- but with duct tape over the Fairway brand, just like the other stores I posted. It's so bizarre to me that they're using the brand in the liquor store, but they have covered it up on signs directing people to the same liquor store. In case you're wondering, Wakefern owns the trademark for Fairway Wines & Spirits. Wakefern also owns the other related Fairway trademarks.
This store never had a full Gourmet Garage department like Watchung did, but a Gourmet Garage case has had all of its branding stripped with only this out-of-place and somewhat generic "Restaurant Market Meals to go" sign remaining. The red and white lettering, obviously, would've matched the Gourmet Garage branding. These prepared foods are still the same items as what would've been sold under the Gourmet Garage brand, but now completely blank.
Over in coffee, the barrels and individual signs have been stripped of their Fairway brand, too, and now it's simply Iconic NY Favorite Whole Bean Coffee. Below you can clearly see that it's just strips of duct tape (or some other equivalent tape) covering the Fairway logo. Notice, in the third row from the back, what's now the Heaven Dark Blend which would've originally been the Fairway to Heaven Dark Blend.
Same deal over in bakery, where now we simply have Iconic Baguettes instead of Iconic Fairway Baguettes.
And in the deli department, the olive bar has had a black sticker or tape placed over the Fairway name on each tub.
This is an older fixture, dating to before Village acquired Fairway even, so you can see the labels are a little worn anyway. But each one once had the Fairway logo, and now each one has a black bar.
Unlike Watchung, this store didn't have the Fairway cheese department, and instead simply has the Village Cheese Shop.
But the individual cheese signs were Fairway-branded, and as you can see here they've had the Fairway logos individually cut off just like Watchung.
They missed at least one, though, because each sign had the Fairway logo at the top but this manchego was also Fairway branded, so the Fairway name lives on -- if only accidentally -- at this store.
These changes still confound me. It's been a couple months now, and the signs are still covered up with duct tape and whatever else was used to quickly remove the brands. There's no evidence of any bigger-picture changes, and the products also haven't changed, just the names on them. I can't find any evidence of anything like a lawsuit or court order -- those documents would be public -- so whatever the issue is must be internal, probably between Village and Wakefern. A key missing piece is that I haven't yet been to any of the Village-owned Fairway or Gourmet Garage stores since this has begun, so I don't know what the deal is there. As far as I can tell, those branded stores continue to operate normally. I can come up with any number of theories, but they would hardly be grounded in reality, so we'll stick with the simple facts: so far, nothing at all seems to be happening.
But since we haven't previously toured this store, let's take a look! The rest of the pictures in this post are from July 2024, so you might notice a few Fairway logos throughout that have since been removed. Nothing else in the store has really changed.
We enter on the left side to the grand aisle. A small cafe, floral, and this island with sushi and subs are up at the front, with produce just to the right of that. Bakery and prepared foods are behind those in the middle of the grand aisle, with deli and cheese at the back. Seafood and meat line the rest of the back wall. Village has kept some of Fairway's layout here. So there's no way to get from produce to the front end -- you have to either pass through the middle of the store or the back.
Candy and customer service are on the front-end on the other side of the black-and-orange produce wall you can see straight ahead. Dairy/frozen are on the right side of the store along with beer. There's no pharmacy here -- Fairway didn't operate any pharmacies and Village didn't add one when they converted the store.
Here's a look at Fairway's produce department, which was in the same place.
Packaged prepared foods and grab-and-go items line the left-side wall of the store. The liquor store is on the other side of this wall.
And here you can see the first pass-through from the grand aisle to the grocery aisles, to the right above. Self-serve prepared food bars are in the middle of the store.
Here's a look at the area's setup when it was Fairway.
Fairway coffee, still there but now without the brand, and bakery towards the back of the grand aisle. It's interesting to me that Fairway, a somewhat gourmet-focused store, had such a no-nonsense, almost discount store interior. ShopRite, a mainstream supermarket with much less specialty selection than Fairway, has brought in much more upscale decor. Here's the previous setup.
Packaged breads are also here.
Village has also added a Nuts Factory, a local chain of bulk nut and spice shops. So although they've removed Fairway's signature bulk foods area, they've replaced it with what seems to be a much larger selection of bulk foods (but run by an outside vendor).
Fairway olive bar at the back near deli and cheese.
I think most of the departments stayed in the same place during the switch from Fairway to ShopRite (although Fairway had several specialty prepared foods counters that Village removed), but cosmetically it may as well be a brand-new store.
Many of the fixtures were replaced, too, such as this seafood case.
The grocery aisles are now very standard, and from here on out you won't see much that resembles the prior Fairway. Fairway's setup was much more warehouse-like, and ShopRite's looks like a regular supermarket. The idea with Fairway was that it was a no-nonsense store with nothing special about its look or setup, but that the products were unusual and exceptional. It's no-frills gourmet -- essentially the same original promise of Gourmet Garage, which Village now also owns. Neither brand today is anything like their original intention.
Candy in the front corner (and produce is on the other side of this wall).
Customer service is up next on the front wall, with the registers beyond it.
Both times I've been in this ShopRite, it's been very busy, so I have to assume that was a good decision. The Manhattan Fairway stores are different -- for one, they're in Manhattan, not the suburbs. But they're smaller-format stores, not locations that would lend themselves easily to a ShopRite conversion. Village has struggled somewhat with the Fairway locations. They took them over during the coronavirus, as people left Manhattan, and the stores saw a significant drop in volume. I don't know whether they ever recovered from that.
One sign of Fairway: these Fairway-branded spices in the spice aisle. I don't know whether they are still there, as I forgot to check.
I don't know if Fairway had a service butcher counter, but ShopRite doesn't.
And dairy is in the back-right corner.
This is all pretty standard Village decor, which we've seen in other stores previously.
It also looks like Village replaced many of these fixtures, as they seemed all but brand-new when I visited.
Dairy and beer in the last aisle. Village also replaced the flooring throughout the store. They have not significantly renovated any of the Manhattan Fairway stores beyond some small changes.
And a look across the front-end, towards candy/customer service. I think this store makes sense as a ShopRite, although it's quite different from its past life as a Fairway. And I am keeping my eyes and ears open for any clue as to what's going on with the branding changes, but so far, you know everything I know.
Saturday
Owner: Village Super Market
Previous Tenants: Korvette's (1966-1980) > Caldor (1980-1999) > Kmart (1999-2002) > Fairway Market (2009-2022)
Cooperative: Wakefern Food Corp.
Location: 847 Pelham Pkwy, Pelham, NY
Photographed: July 12, 2024 and June 30, 2025
Here's a look at this weekend's other posts!
- Checking in on a Village Super Market-owned ShopRite (this post)
- CTown opens new stores in Brooklyn and the Bronx
Sunday
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