The Market Report

These Boston suburbs have had a lot to see over the last couple weeks! We've seen all the stores in Chestnut Hill and Newton, but only one of the stores in Needham. The stores I haven't posted (or photographed) are in gray, and notice that the former Stop & Shop in Newton is also on the map. Take a look at all of them in the map below! Coming Up Next It's time for the final group of stores within Boston! We've now covered the whole city except for Allston and Brighton on the far northwestern side of the city. As I've mentioned, there are a couple neighborhoods of Boston that were annexed from other towns outside the city over the years, and Allston and Brighton are geographically separated from the rest of the city for that reason. We're just northwest of Brookline , and east of the Newton stores we saw more recently. We'll tour Brighton first, starting in the southwestern corner near the Brookline border, then up into Allston. The northern part of All...

Whole Foods Market Opened: 2003 Owner:  Amazon Previous Tenants:  Purity Supreme (early 1950s-early 1990s) > Nature's Heartland (open by 1997, closed by 2000) > Bread & Circus (opened by 2000, converted to Whole Foods in 2003) Cooperative:  none Location:  647 Washington St, Newtonville, MA Photographed:  December 17, 2022 "Why does that one Whole Foods have a fork stuck in its roof?" That was the burning question a friend who grew up in Newton Highlands had for me when we started talking about supermarkets. Well, I don't know, but is it truly a fork if there's no handle? A Google search for " can you have a fork without a handle " brings up not a whole lot of helpful results. Google's generally useless AI overview says that yes, you can have a handleless fork for a "touch of elegance," and if you click on the source for that particular piece of wisdom, you will find yourself on a website with pictures of forklift trucks. Okay. S...

Marty's Opened:  1994 Owner:  Martin Siegal Previous Tenants:  Newtonville Wine Shop Cooperative:  none Location:  675 Washington St, Newtonville, MA Photographed:  December 17, 2022 Full disclosure: Marty's is not a supermarket. It's not even really a grocery store. The 12,000 square foot store is first and foremost a beautiful wine store. But the left side of the building also has a great selection of specialty foods, cheeses, and the like. And that alone warrants its inclusion here on The Market Report. If you enter and make a left, there are a few aisles of gourmet foods, and a counter for cheeses and prepared foods. It's a very high-end selection, and there's a lot of unique items here. This is only about a third of the sales floor, though, as the majority is dedicated to wine. And it's a large selection displayed very attractively. Overall, it's an upscale store. I don't drink, so every time I go into a liquor store I always feel out of place. Or e...

Star Market Opened: ca. 2015 Owner:  Albertsons Companies Previous Tenants:  Star Market (1963-early 00s) > Shaw's (early 00s-ca. 2015) Cooperative:  none Location:  33 Austin St, Newtonville, MA Photographed:  December 18, 2020 and December 17, 2022 Contributor:  Lars D. If there's one thing you remember about Boston supermarkets, it's that grocers in this area get creative. They've managed to stick supermarkets in former theaters , the basement of a famous department store , the basement of a train station , a semicircle building , and a former car dealership . But have you ever seen a supermarket built on top of a highway before? If you even have a passing interest in supermarkets of the Boston area, you've probably heard of the famous Newtonville Star Market. This unusual store was constructed in all of its brutalist glory in 1963, shortly after the Auburndale location opened. And a store like this just begs the question. Why? WGBH's Curiosity Desk...