The Market of Point Pleasant Beach
Opened: July 10, 2026
Let's get one thing straight before we tour this new store at the Jersey Shore: It's 2026, not 1972. Right? Right. Okay. Keep that in mind. So here we are in Point Pleasant Beach! It's a shore town, about halfway between Asbury Park and Seaside Heights, and home to Jenkinson's Boardwalk, which you might've heard of. It's also home to this supermarket, which faithfully served the town's business district as the only grocer for decades. It was an ACME starting around the 1940s, becoming a Foodtown about 20 or 30 years later. By the 1970s, it was a Norkus Foodtown, which sold all their stores to Stop & Shop in 2011. Stop & Shop then closed here in 2024. Now, the store has been taken over by Adam Shapiro's company which seems to be using the name Shap Markets. Most recently, they've opened in Waldwick, and this store brings them to a total of five locations, all in New Jersey.
Above are a few pictures of the Stop & Shop before it closed. You can see that the new owners have fixed up the outside with a sharp new paint job and some new siding, but it's not a total overhaul. Still, it looks good.
One more thing: let's address one of the big questions before we go in. This was supposed to be a Food Emporium (like Waldwick and a sister store in Maplewood). So why isn't it? I'm not entirely sure, but I'll tell you what I do know. In early 2026, Shap Markets' three stores, which were affiliated with Allegiance/Foodtown, left to switch to Key Food. Key Food owns the rights to the SuperFresh and Food Emporium names, so Shap Markets used those names on some of their stores, including the new one they opened in Waldwick. But now, for some reason, this new location isn't affiliated with Key Food. Instead, it's part of the Associated Supermarket Group. Because it's not Key Food, they don't have the rights to use Food Emporium branding for this location.
The store is around 18,000 square feet, so it's on the small side. It has a slightly awkward setup with a low ceiling around much of the perimeter, so it feels smaller. Produce, baked goods, and grab and go are in the first aisle here, with deli and meat on the back wall. Dairy and frozen are on the right side with the registers on the front end. The basic setup hasn't been changed since the Stop & Shop days, but the appearance has...
...with this decor package that looks straight out of 1972. Although the general look of the other stores is similar inside, this one looks completely different and several decades older. I even commented on the Waldwick store looking somewhat dated already, but man, I hadn't experienced this one yet. That said, it's bright, clean, and extremely well-appointed. My best guess is that the decor matters almost not at all.
Tough to even get pictures of it with how small and cramped the store is.
You can see that the bones (including most of the fixtures) are left over from Stop & Shop, but the new owners did put in a significant amount of work. I know there were a few photos of the Stop & Shop interior circulating out there, but I can't find them right now.
The grocery aisles are pretty straightforward and probably not that different from Stop & Shop. One possible difference: The few prices I paid attention to seemed very high, but that's probably just the reality of being an independent supermarket in a resort town. So far, this store doesn't seem to be running a circular, which three of the other four locations do.
What's not yet clear is whether the other four stores will also shift over to ASG (and therefore lose their access to The Food Emporium and SuperFresh branding). I did see some employee shirts here that said "The Market: Point Pleasant Beach - Waldwick - Maplewood - Bloomingdale", which might suggest they're looking to just switch those four over to the generic The Market name. The fifth store, Marrazzo's Market, doesn't use a brand name like that so it wouldn't have to change its name.
It'll be interesting to keep an eye on any further developments with this group, but for now, the other four stores are still Key Food and still have an up-to-date circular on the Key Food website.
I still can hardly believe these sky-blue panels with the diagonal striping and wood paneling are all new and not left over from some long-ago tenant! But overall, I don't mind the look of the store because it's plenty bright and airy-feeling.
It also seemed rather busy, so it's probably serving a need. Check out the alcove below for bread, which is labeled aisle 8. Every inch of this tiny store is put to use for the busy summer season.
Opened: July 10, 2026
Owner: Adam Shapiro
Previous Tenants: ACME Markets (1940s-ca. 1960s) > Foodtown (ca. 1960s-2011) > Stop & Shop (2011-2024)
Cooperative: Associated Supermarket Group
Location: 505 Richmond Ave, Point Pleasant Beach, NJ
Photographed: July 16, 2026
All in all, it's nice to see a new store in this closed Stop & Shop, but I'm left with some questions out of this one. Most notably, will the other four Shap Markets stores also move over to ASG? Or will this one eventually find its way to Key Food? No way to know for sure now, but in the meantime, here's a look at this weekend's other posts!
Saturday
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