The Market Report

Closing out our Hudson Valley week with a look at a former Grand Union which has since been taken over by...drumroll please...CVS, of course! Yes, it's got that distinctive Grand Union look to it! Although I'm not sure that I've ever seen a GU with this facade and the ornaments (the cupola, the eaves) together. Funny thing is, there's no CVS sign on the building itself. There must be zoning restrictions in place that prevent this. It's still a pretty attractive building, though. It fits in well with the surroundings. Maybe too well. It's very hard to see driving by. Although Woodstock lost its GU, it still has a grocery store. See Sunflower Foods . Getting a little closer, it appears that there may have been another storefront to the left of the Grand Union. The windows are probably original, although the doors have been replaced. Grand Union's sign would probably have been right underneath the cupola. Again, probably due to zoning l...

At the time of my visit, this small greengrocer and international-foods store was located just around the corner from CTown at 5 Bank St. It's since been changed from Royal Fresh Market to Earth Produce by Rachel. It's a very small store but it's very clean and has a nice selection of fresh produce and, as the sign indicates, international foods. (Funny, I believe that neither of those terms is the preferred term for what they refer to; it would be most accurately written as Latin and Caribbean Grocery.) Photographed May 2016

CTown Supermarkets Owner: Wilson Narvaez Opened: 2004 Previous Tenants: non-grocery tenants Cooperative: Krasdale Location: 1049 Park St, Peekskill, NY Photographed: July 10, 2026 Before we begin, just a heads up: this was originally posted in April 2019, but was rewritten with new photos in July 2026. Now for the post! (Diehard blog fans may recall the original version of this post and its absolutely horrendous formatting from way back in December 2016. It was time for an update, so here's everything completely re-done plus new photos.) The only thing salvageable from my original set of 2016 pictures (they were many cell phones ago and therefore pretty rough) is this photo of the store as it was getting an exterior renovation, above and to the left. You can see the store after the exterior upgrade here, too, and there's been a small expansion in the front-right corner which is now this glass tower area. It looks like there's also a second floor or mezzanine here, poss...

North of both Haverstraw and Beacon on the west side of the Hudson River is Highland. We'll be making a quick stop here before heading back down to the southern part of the Hudson Valley tomorrow. After snapping a million photos from the car window driving by, into the sun but on a really gray day, I managed to salvage only two. This store, as you might notice, is quite similar in design to the last (I think) un-fruit-bowled Stop & Shop in New Jersey, which is of course Paramus . Both share a heritage as Grand Unions built in the 80s when, I'm sure, this design was the coolest thing out there. This Hannaford has been kept up better than the Stop & Shop, it seems. It's also seen a more recent interior renovation, on which the Paramus location is still waiting. Here's a look across the supermarket and the strip mall it's in. We can see inside thanks to a 360 view on Google Maps. Looks like it's been recently renovated with a decor package I'm...

One more stop in Haverstraw (actually, West Haverstraw) today before we head north up the Hudson River tomorrow! We'll take a quick look here at a Stop & Shop, the larger supermarket in town. Now, to be clear, I didn't say the more modern store, although Ideal isn't exactly state-of-the-art either. Funny thing is, there's only one logo on this store, and it's on the side! Granted, this side faces the highway, but it's still strange not to have a logo on the front. No, you're not seeing things. That's a massive curved glass greenhouse-type facade. Here's a better look from Google Maps... Oh yes. Just let the beauty of that sink in. Yikes. This store is at 7 Samsondale Plz, West Haverstraw. Photographed June 2017

Let's jump just next door from  9W Farm to Ideal Food Basket, which is more of a complete supermarket. It's part of America's Food Basket, an approximately 50-store cooperative with stores primarily in New York City and the Boston metropolitan area. For whatever reason, I felt the need to again summarize the history of America's Food Basket. Even though I had done it before . More than once . I suppose the only thing I can add now is that the original NSA group was specifically a group of Dominican store owners (as, by the way, both Fine Fare and Bravo were). It's a very interesting building here with the arch roof and the random castle-like facade, all combined with the elongated-A&P-type capsule shape sign. I don't know anything about the history of this building other than the fact that the Ideal was previously an NSA and before that, a Met Foodmarkets (as most Ideal stores were). I know this from a mixture of conjecture and the observations...