The Market Report

Today's store is small. I think that kind of could start all of these posts, but it's true. There's just so little space in these neighborhoods, and real estate is at a premium. This Food Dynasty is just a block east of Sal's , and it feels smaller (it might not be, but it's certainly more cramped). It definitely has more selection and more customers though! As small as this store does look, it was expanded. You can see what it previously looked like here (and see the source here -- I'm pretty sure 98% of that article is complete BS). Here's the approximate layout: large produce displays outside. Deli immediately inside the entrance, with produce and then packaged meat on the left wall (first aisle). Dairy/frozen in the last aisle and checkouts on the front wall. Once again, very attractive exterior displays. This is as much of a shot of the produce-deli area as I could get, but you get the idea. Nice new fixtures, updated decor, ni...

Right under the Fordham Center sign we saw yesterday is a greengrocer with several other departments as well. At the time of my visit, it was Sal's Fruit & Vegetables, but when driving by later, I noticed the awning had been painted. Sal's was a large store with strangely little selection, although they did have a lot of produce. The storefront is, in fact, so wide I couldn't get it all in one shot! Not a bad display at all of produce outside, but unfortunately it didn't look like it was really drawing customers into the store. This set of exterior and interior photographs comes from June 2018, but when I drove by again in August 2018, the awning had been painted dark green. A new sign saying "Fruit Meat Market" has been added along the bottom, as you can see on Google Maps. The store is made up of several smaller storefronts combined. Inside, the store was kind of dingy and definitely, well, rough around the edges. They did have a meat...

As I mentioned in yesterday's post on the Food Universe Marketplace, Fordham Rd between University Ave on the west end and Southern Blvd on the east end (which is approximately where the Bronx Zoo is) is a major retail corridor, and it also leads to Fordham University's campus. At either end of this stretch is a large sign welcoming you to Fordham Center. Here's what the west end of the stretch looks like, just east of University Ave. You can also catch a glimpse of tomorrow's Look Inside on the left side of the above picture!

Today's store tour is just a block east of Wednesday's Antillana SuperFood , and is also a newly renovated supermarket. However, unlike Antillana, it appears to have been a supermarket for many decades -- in fact, a supermarket has probably occupied this building since at least the early 1950s, when it was an A&P. The store became a Met Foodmarket by the 1980s before becoming a CTown no later than 2000, I'd bet. CTown converted to Food Universe Marketplace in 2017. Immediately before the switch to Food Universe, the store replaced its CTown awning with a new CTown awning, with the misfortune of the misspelling of the slogan, "Supermarkets for Savings," as "Supermarkets for Servings." This typo is dishearteningly common, as we'll see in a future tour.  As often happens, although ownership didn't change, the switch from CTown to Food Universe brought a major renovation, both exterior and interior. The exterior is practically unrecogniza...

DeVoe Park is located diagonally across the street from the Antillana SuperFood Marketplace we saw yesterday. The park is approximately on the northwestern corner of Fordham and University and is a nice green space in an otherwise dense urban area. Our next store, another Food Universe Marketplace, is located on the southeastern corner of the intersection. Come back for a tour of that store tomorrow!

Heading straight south on University Ave from yesterday's Food Universe Marketplace to check out another store on the next business corridor south, Fordham Rd. This thoroughfare pretty much extends across all of the Bronx (although it becomes Pelham Parkway in the eastern half) and goes directly to the campus of Fordham University.  This store, as far as I know, has no relation to the Antillana Meat Market we saw on Sunday. It is, however, part of a chain with other locations at 1339 Jerome Ave and 1791 Jerome Ave, both in the Bronx. I do not understand the affiliation with SuperFood Marketplace, a New Jersey-based store with locations in Elizabeth and Ridgefield. Here's the approach to Antillana so that you can get a feel for Fordham Rd. The supermarket is on the corner and has the red awning. Like so many of these urban supermarkets, the store is pieced together from multiple smaller storefronts, with the corner part apparently under renovation to be a restauran...