Skip to main content

Remsen Village Marketplace - Brooklyn, NY

Image
By Zachary
Remsen Village Marketplace
Opened: October 2025
Owner: Robert Almonte
Previous Tenants: Fine Fare > Met Foodmarkets > Food Universe Marketplace
Cooperative: Krasdale
Location: 405 Remsen Ave, Brooklyn, NY
Photographed: October 29, 2025; December 1, 2025; and February 11, 2025 (Food Universe)
A small, mostly residential neighborhood between East Flatbush and Brownsville, Remsen Village isn't a neighborhood you hear much talk of. Today, we're going to check out the supermarket right in the middle of the neighborhood as it makes a (relatively minor) change.
405 Remsen Avenue appears to have been a grocery store since at least the 1980s, eventually becoming Fine Fare in the early 00s or so. Fine Fare closed around 2013, becoming a Met Foodmarket the following year. In 2015, the store became a Food Universe, a Key Food brand. And just two months ago, the store has changed its name again, this time becoming the independent Remsen Village Marketplace.
I'm very good at accidentally stumbling upon supermarkets getting a new sign. In this case, I hadn't previously heard that this store was being rebranded (or, perhaps more accurately, de-branded) until I happened to be driving by and noticed the new green awning.
The Food Universe signage has actually been stashed in the front of the store under the awning, and if you look carefully below you can make out the back of the FOOD sign above the white rectangle. It's unclear exactly why this store left Key Food/Food Universe, and the situation seems a little unusual. This store and its sister location, a very old store at 1038 Rutland Rd half a mile away, both disappeared from the Key Food website this fall. This one has been rebranded to Remsen Village Marketplace, and is now being supplied by Krasdale Foods. But the Rutland Road one -- truly one of the most rundown stores I've been to recently -- is still open and still has the Food Universe branding inside and out. The shelves are still stocked, but barely, with products from Key Food. They seem to have been sitting for a while, though, and it doesn't look like they're getting new deliveries of grocery items. My guess is that one is preparing to close, while this one will continue on under Krasdale. I don't know that for certain, though.
I must say that this Remsen Village store isn't in great shape, either, although it's significantly better than the Rutland Road one. The new paint job on the outside is fresh and crisp, and looking good.
Inside, it's very clear this is an older supermarket. The deli is immediately inside the entrance to the right, with produce in the rest of the first aisle. Meats line the back wall, with dairy and frozen on the left side. In the front half of the left side, there are a few short aisles that run side to side instead of front to back.
This is going to be the least exciting before-and-after ever, as really nothing about the store has changed other than the brand. But I wanted to show both sets of pictures. The Food Universe (before) pictures come from February, while the rest come from late October.
If you look carefully at the above pictures, you can see that the Key Food sale signs hanging above the deli and on the warmer have been replaced with yellow Krasdale tags.
But a poster hanging in the produce department advertising Urban Meadow, a Key Food storebrand, seems to still be there...
This store is small, just about 6100 square feet. Here's a look inside the Fine Fare that previously occupied this space. You can see that the bones are the same.
Many, though not all, Food Universe stores in the city are very well-kept, so it was a bit of a surprise to me to see the Remsen and Rutland stores a bit more rundown than the others.
To give you an idea: in the "before" picture above, taken back in February, you can see a ceiling tile half-missing with water damage. It hadn't been fixed by the time I visited months later, below.
The grocery aisles are pretty straightforward, and if you look very carefully at the pictures above and below, you can see the Key Food price tags have been removed and replaced with Krasdale tags.
The last aisle has dairy on the inside and frozen on the outside, which then runs along the outside of the store.
Just beyond the yellow post visible here are the few short grocery aisles that run side-to-side.
You can see here missing ceiling tiles and flooring patched with plywood and duct tape. That's far from most Food Universe stores that tend to be very clean and well-maintained, though again, not all. That said, there has been a lawsuit between the supermarket owners, who also own the property, and the developers of the new building next door, which you can see in the exterior pictures, claiming that the developers have caused damage to the 405 Remsen building through their construction. (The lawsuit was settled out of court earlier this year.) So it's very possible some of the damage to this building isn't due to a lack of maintenance.
Beer is also up in the front corner.
And a look at the front end, again with almost no change before and after. We'll see if this store gets more renovation work over time, but it looks like this is all for now.
Don't miss the rest of this weekend's other posts here!

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment