The Market Report

ACME Markets Opened: 2020 Previous Tenants:  The Fresh Grocer (2001-2020) Location:  4001 Walnut St, University City, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  December 2021 It's time to tour the newest ACME! This supermarket opened in 2001 as a location of Philadelphia-based The Fresh Grocer, which closed in 2020 after the supermarket's landlord, the University of Pennsylvania, chose not to renew their lease. My guess is that ACME probably saw an opportunity here to jump in, offer more money, and turn this store into one of their flagship locations. UPenn terminated The Fresh Grocer's lease in 2016 after The Fresh Grocer didn't renew it on time, and announced in 2017 that ACME would be replacing The Fresh Grocer. After a lengthy legal struggle, The Fresh Grocer closed in 2020. ACME renovated the store rather quickly, and from what I remember (I visited The Fresh Grocer around 2015), they totally redid the whole store's interior. The Fresh Grocer was mazelike and dingy, whi...

Supremo Food Market Owner: Eddie Trujillo Opened:  2016 Previous Tenants:  Penn Fruit (closed ca. 1970s) > Thriftway (ca. 1970s-ca. 2001) > Supreme Food Market (2003-2008) > Supreme Shop n Bag (2008-2016) Cooperative:  none Location:  4301 Walnut St, University City, Philadephia, PA Photographed:  December 2021 It's been a while since we saw a Supremo, huh? Well, in addition to the 12 Supremos and Supremo-owned stores we've seen so far, there are two here in Philadelphia. The first is in the University City neighborhood, so named for its location with many universities in a very close radius, including the University of Pennsylvania. One of my best friends has a sister who lives in this neighborhood and works at Temple University in North Philadelphia, and she lives right between this Supremo and the ACME a few blocks away (previously The Fresh Grocer). Well, we talk about supemarkets and apparently they talk about me, so I got the news of this store's...

Cousins Fresh Market Owner: Rushdi Mohammad Opened:  2013 Cooperative:  none Location:  5429 W Girard Ave, Carroll Park, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  December 2021 Our second Philadelphia tour, about half a mile south of yesterday's ShopRite , bears a lot of similarities to the American Family Market we saw in Narberth. It was also built in the early 1950s (or so) as an A&P, although this one was retrofitted with a very simple Centennial facade in the early 1960s. I doubt this store made it to the SuperFresh (post-1983) era, when all Philadelphia-area A&P stores were converted to SuperFresh, and at some point it became an American Family Market also. The Girard American Family Market eventually gave way to the KS Thriftway , and it's unclear whether that store was actually affiliated with the Thriftway cooperative given that they didn't use the logo on the sign. That store closed around 2012, being converted to a Cousins Fresh Market in 2013. Cousins Fres...