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Metro Acres Market - Manhattan, NY (East Village)

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By Zachary
Metro Acres Market
Opened: March 13, 2026
Owner: Ennis and Rowhie Said
Previous Tenants: Rite Aid
Cooperative: Retail Grocers Group/General Trading
Location: 81 1st Ave, Manhattan, NY
Photographed: April 17, 2026
I hope everyone's doing well! I myself have been very busy, so I've been behind in both visiting new stores and posting about them. (Don't worry, no interruptions to the regularly scheduled programming.) So now I'm trying to catch up -- but I'm sitting on more than a dozen newsworthy stores that I've been to but haven't posted about yet. Let's start to fix that with this weekend's NYC posts!
You may recall this closed East Village Rite Aid, which hadn't yet gotten a brand when I posted about it back in December. Turns out, it's a Metro Acres Market -- one of only three under the brand, joining locations on the Lower East Side and in Schuylerville (there was previously another in Washington Heights that became a Fine Fare). Here's the thing: as you might have learned by now, NYC supermarket brands don't matter. There's nothing that connects these three Metro Acres Market other than a shared distributor, General Trading of Carlstadt, NJ, and this store owned by Ennis and Rowhie Said is more similar to their other store which is a Key Food-affiliated Food Universe in Brooklyn. (They also briefly owned a Foodtown and they run with their family various other supermarkets in the city.)
That said, the Saids run good supermarkets -- Ennis and Rowhie are brothers, both in their 20s (so they're pretty young), whose family members also are in the grocery business. This new Metro Acres Market is sharp, well-merchandised, and already receiving rave reviews with an average of 4.8 stars on Google Maps.
It's not large, but has a lot to offer. At just under 6000 square feet (at ground level -- there may be a basement), it has a large produce department, beer in the back-right corner, meat on the back wall, and dairy/frozen on the left side. Deli, along with a hot food and salad bar, are in the front-left corner. There are also dedicated sections for specialty cheeses and fresh baked goods, though the store isn't large enough to truly make each of those their own department.
I'm loving all of these supermarkets that replace drugstores. So many of them are so well-done that you'd hardly know this was ever anything other than a supermarket.
This sleek, modern supermarket is a far cry from the Rite Aid's interior.
Metro Acres Market is part of the same group that runs Fine Fare and Shop Fair supermarkets. I'm not totally clear on what the distinctions (if there are any) are between these brands, but this store has a slightly higher-end selection than the average Fine Fare.
Frozen foods in the second-to-last aisle.
And dairy lines both sides of the last aisle, with packaged deli items up at the front.
There aren't dedicated bakery or cheese departments, but those selections are worked into the existing deli and dairy departments. You can see, for instance, that the dairy case includes a nice selection of specialty cheeses.
Looking towards the back of the store...
The service deli is in the front-left corner along with baked goods and a self-serve hot food/salad bar.
And looking towards the deli corner from the produce side, you can see it's not a very large store...
That's all for this Metro Acres Market, but check back soon for more of the other stores I still have to post! In the meantime...

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