The Market Report

Original Tenant: Penn Fruit Address: 301 W Chelten Ave, Germantown, Philadelphia, PA Opened:  1950s Closed:  ca. 1976 Later Tenants:  ShopRite (ca. 1976-ca. 2003) > The Fresh Grocer (ca. 2003-2011) > subdivided Photographed:  July 2021 Not a great picture, but a quick shot of the former Fresh Grocer in Germantown. This store, just a block west of Chelten Market , was originally a 1950s-era Penn Fruit before being sold to some ShopRite owner in the late 70s (probably in 1976), which closed around 2003. The Fresh Grocer opened shortly thereafter and then closed in early 2011. The 33,000 square foot store was subdivided into several smaller stores, including a Dollar Tree. At the same time, Save-A-Lot built a new store behind this existing building with a roughly 17,000 square foot footprint. Interestingly enough, at least initially, the Save-A-Lot was relocating from 5753 Wayne Ave and would be, like the closed Fresh Grocer, owned by the Burns family . Interes...

Chelten Market IGA Owner: Young Kim Opened:  2017 Cooperative:  IGA Location:  176 W Chelten Ave, Germantown, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  July 2021 Fans of Pathmark seem to have largely missed the Chelten Market IGA, which is as good as we're going to get of a time capsule of 1990s Pathmark at this point. It's also a very pleasant neighborhood supermarket. Let's review the history of this store before we take a tour. The 33,000 square foot building was built (presumably slightly smaller) by Food Fair in the 1960s or so. In Food Fair's 1979 bankruptcy, A&P acquired this store, later converting it to SuperFresh in 1982. The SuperFresh had a fire around 1995, and when SuperFresh decided not to reopen the store, Pathmark renovated the building and opened. Pathmark closed in 2016, and after some light renovation, the Chelten Market IGA opened the following year. Most of that history comes, as usual, from JoshAustin610 . It's very obvious that not too much has be...

The Fresh Grocer of LaSalle Owner: Pat Burns Opened:  2009 Previous Tenants:  none Cooperative:  Wakefern Food Corp. Location:  5301 Chew Ave, East Germantown, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  July 2021 Welcome to our first Pennsylvania Fresh Grocer! This almost exactly 50,000 square foot store was built as a new-construction in 2009 along with a small strip mall. We're in the East Germantown neighborhood but this store is referred to as The Fresh Grocer of LaSalle, given that the campus of LaSalle University is directly across the street. (Some supermarket fans online have speculated that these days, Wakefern uses The Fresh Grocer mostly in areas of Philadelphia near colleges. That's certainly possible, though the specificity of the brand is diluted by the addition of Nicholas Markets stores in northern NJ and the Gerrity's stores in NEPA.) This is the first (and only) Burns-owned Fresh Grocer I've photographed. The Burns family started The Fresh Grocer somewhe...