The Market Report

Believe it or not, everybody, we've seen every supermarket in Boston except for one! I hope you've enjoyed our trip around the city, and of course, we're not yet done with the greater Boston area -- we have plenty of time still to spend in the northern suburbs and the north shore of MA -- but our last few days in Allston and Brighton have finished up our look at the city's grocery stores. Here's a look at our visits from these neighborhoods! Coming Up Next Cambridge and Somerville are the next two suburbs north of Boston, and they're really cities in their own right. Cambridge has a population near 120,000, and Somerville -- the more suburban one -- has over 80,000 people. And those people are densely packed into just over 10 square miles. Cambridge is home to both Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), while Tufts University's campus is partially in Somerville. You've probably heard the stereotypical Boston "pahk t...

Trader Joe's Opened: 2017 Owner:  Aldi Nord Previous Tenants:  none Cooperative:  none Location:  199 N Harvard St, Allston, MA Photographed:  July 27, 2019 Welcome to Lower Allston, which (as I mentioned on the preview post for this neighborhood ) is paradoxically the northern part of Allston. This Trader Joe's is also our final store post in the city of Boston! This Trader Joe's opened in 2017 in a newly-built mixed use development. It's 13,000 square feet. Inside, the store feels a lot like any other Trader Joe's, with the produce department on the right side, meats in the back-right corner, cheese/deli at the back, frozen in the middle, and nonfoods on the left side. I was a bit surprised to see that the store has a somewhat low ceiling (and I think the low-hanging lights and unusually large number of pipes and ducts running across the ceiling doesn't help). You get the feeling of a basement store , although you're on the ground floor here, not below s...

Star Market Opened: ca. 2008 Owner:  Albertsons Companies Previous Tenants:  Star Market (1997-early 00s) > Shaw's (early 00s-ca. 2008) Cooperative:  none Location:  370 Western Ave, Brighton, MA Photographed:  July 27, 2019 Happy Wednesday, and now we're down to the last two stores of Boston! Today's tour is the Star Market on Western Avenue in Brighton, a spacious store of around 60,000 square feet. It was built as a Star Market in 1997, but as with most of the Boston Star Markets, it briefly became a Shaw's from the early 00s to around 2008 -- making it one of the earlier conversions back to Star Market. It's going on 30 years old but still feels relatively new, as it's been renovated several times in its life. The store likely got a renovation during its time as a Shaw's to the Premium Fresh & Healthy decor package -- there are some curved overhangs that seem to resemble that deocr package -- and was renovated to the current decor package when it...

Stop & Shop Open:  1992-2024 Owner:  Ahold Delhaize Previous Tenants:  none Cooperative:  none Location:  60 Everett St, Allston, MA Photographed:  July 27, 2019 and July 6, 2024 Welcome to the Allston Stop & Shop! Now, let's be clear: this store doesn't exactly exist anymore. Sure, there's still an Allston Stop & Shop, and in the summer of 2024, it moved just across the street to a new-build location as this property is being redeveloped. See here . It's a prime location next to the Boston Landing train station, so it only makes sense that a massive, suburban-style supermarket with a massive, suburban-style parking lot isn't the best use of this space. Let's tour the old store, which wasn't even that old when it closed. It opened in 1992, then was likely redone in the mid-00s. At nearly 70,000 square feet, it's quite large. It had the Taste & Time decor package by the time that I visited, but that's newer than this store is, so I wo...