The Market Report

Original Tenant: Pathmark Address: 175 Passaic Ave, Kearny, NJ Opened:  1990s Closed:  2012 Later Tenants:  LA Fitness Photographed:  June 2020 Today's snapshot is just across the street from the former Foodtown . This Pathmark was built in the 1990s on the site of the original Two Guys from Harrison (later just Two Guys) department store. Before I really got into retail history, my family would talk about having shopped at Two Guys but I didn't realize it was an extremely local company (being based, of course, in Harrison, NJ, which borders Kearny to the south). That said, my knowledge of this location is somewhat limited so you can see more history here . We can see that today, LA Fitness has kept almost all of Pathmark's facade, just painted it a different color. It actually looks pretty good today! Our next stop is a quarter of a mile south on Passaic Avenue, and is the only remaining supermarket in this immediate area. Head over to The Market Report tomorro...

Original Tenant:  Vitale Foodtown Address: 274 Passaic Ave, Kearny, NJ Opened:  with rest of mall Closed:  by 1998 Later Tenants:  subdivided Photographed:  June 2020 Today's former supermarket is on Passaic Avenue in Kearny, which once was a major shopping hub. This mall had a Kmart and a Foodtown, the mall across the street had a Two Guys that later became a Pathmark, and a ShopRite was just down the street. The primarily industrial area just to the south is being redeveloped into residential and retail spaces, making this once again a retail center. The Foodtown has been subdivided and the Kmart is barely hanging on; the Two Guys/Pathmark is now an LA Fitness, and a Marshalls is also in that mall, the ShopRite is still there and busier than ever, and a new BJ's was built between the Foodtown/Kmart and ShopRite malls. We'll see the ShopRite tomorrow on The Market Report !

Our next (fairly brief) stop in our tour of New Jersey is Hudson County! We've extensively covered the northern parts of the county previously, with Union City and West New York covered here . We've also been to Harrison and Jersey City previously. We're back for some more stores, more extensively covering the areas we haven't been to yet. We're going to start to the west of the Hackensack River for stores in North Arlington and Kearny, before crossing the river and passing through the Hackensack River Waterfront, Bergen-Lafayette, and Downtown/Newport in Jersey City; then over to Hoboken, circling north for one more store in Union City, and finishing out Jersey City with the Heights in the northwestern corner of the city. Lots of good stuff coming up, so head over to The Independent Edition for tomorrow's tour! HOUSEKEEPING:  I know a lot of the links have been wrong lately, and I believe they've all been fixed. However, there might still be a few broke...

Original Tenant:  Sidney Cohen's Economy Shop-Rite Market Address:  565 S Livingston Ave, Livingston, NJ Opened: ca. 1950 Closed:  ca. 1965 Later Tenants:  subdivided Photographed:  June 2020 We wrap up our Essex County coverage with this former ShopRite, which according to a 1956 Wakefern member directory was the Economy Shop-Rite Market owned by Sidney Cohen. Livingston also had a former ShopRite at the north end of the town, which was not that big -- a former Safeway which was expanded by Village ShopRite. This store was later purchased by Village and combined with the northern location into the existing ShopRite by 1968, but has been expanded and renovated beyond recognition since. You can tour it here . Make sure to see our other store today, the Kings in town, here . Tomorrow, we have one final store here in Livingston before wrapping up Essex County altogether, so check it out on The Independent Edition !

Kings Food Markets Opened: by 1964 Previous Tenants:  none Location:  255 S Livingston Ave, Livingston, NJ Photographed:  November 2020, January 2021, February 2021, and March 2021 We're returning for our ACME-acquisition update here at the Kings in Livingston, which we previously saw inside a few years ago . (For those who haven't been caught up, ACME Markets purchased 27 stores from Kings and Balducci's, with the sale closing on January 23, 2021.) While ACME did purchase this store, they had to close the liquor store since any corporation is limited to owning two liquor stores in the state. I'm not sure exactly what the inside looks like, but I believe Kings owns liquor stores at Millburn and Summit post-ACME acquisition. Consequently, ACME negotiated a lower lease for this store with the landlord to avoid closure. Since it seems this is a less-profitable location for the chain, ACME probably will either work hard to try to turn it around or give it up. Immediately...

Original Tenant:  Dave's Market Address:  184 Essex St, Millburn, NJ Opened:  1940s Closed:  unknown Later Tenants:  ShopRite > CTown Supermarkets Photographed:  March 2019 ShopRite is the undisputed leader of the New Jersey grocery market, and operator Village Super Market has a location just a quarter mile outside of town that's been in that location since 1976. There was at least one other former ShopRite in Millburn, a little over a quarter mile to the east of this location at 249 Millburn Ave . If that store opened in the early 60s, it was likely a replacement for this one. This location is actually a landmark store for the Wakefern group. Prior to the store's ShopRite affiliation, it was Dave's Market owned by Dave Fern. I might have explained this previously, but Wakefern (the cooperative that runs ShopRite stores, formed in 1946) is named after a portmanteau of the original members' names: Weiss, Aidekman, Kesselman, and Fern. B...

ShopRite of Millburn Owner:  Robert Sumas / Village Super Market Opened:  1976 Previous Tenants:  Staff-Good Deal Cooperative:  Wakefern Food Corp. Location:  220 Main St, Millburn, NJ Photographed:  January 2020 Quick update here at the ShopRite of Millburn, NJ to see that the new logo has been installed on the outside (of course, the logo was officially switched in 2002). We've previously toured the store here and seen a historical photo here . Based on some additional information sent in from a 1973 article by the Millburn-Short Hills Historical Society, Staff-Good Deal was based out of Elizabeth, NJ and at its peak in the 1960s had 14 stores. Its financial troubles were solidified by the early 1970s, closing several stores in Bergen and Passaic counties in 1973 before going under in 1976. Unfortunately, we determined that I do not have the ability to post the article because of copyright protections, but those are the key points. Th...

Original Tenant: Safeway Address: 516 Millburn Ave, Millburn, NJ Opened:  1940s Closed:  by 1962 Later Tenants:  Kings Food Markets (1967-1980) Photographed:  December 2020 Today's store is a very small 3100 square foot store that started as an early Safeway and later became an outpost of local chain Kings Food Markets, whose first store opened in 1936 just under two miles west in Summit. Unlike most Safeways in New Jersey, this one did not become a Finast, I'd assume because of its small size, and it may have closed before the rest of the stores were sold to Finast. The ShopRite in Springfield half a mile west of this store was a later Safeway that became a Finast and then a ShopRite. In 1980, when this store closed, it moved three-quarters of a mile northwest into a former Stop & Shop. Check out that tour here . Up next we have a quick update to another supermarket in town over on The Market Report !

Kings Food Markets Opened:  1980 Previous Tenants:  Stop & Shop (1969-1980) Location:  778 Morris Tpk, Short Hills, Millburn, NJ Photographed:  December 2019 Okay, we have three stores here in Millburn and one in Livingston before we move on to Hudson County! We've actually been to this store before, in a 2018 snapshot , but we're back for a tour. I'd like to make two corrections to that original post. First, the original Kings was not in Millburn! It was in Summit, just over the border into Union County. We'll see the original Kings and the store that replaced it when we circle through that part of Union County. Second, the picture I link on Google Maps is not the interior of this store. It's a generic picture that Kings used for all of its stores (but, at the time, had only been posted to this store's page). This store, in fact, still sports the Where Inspiration Strikes 2012-era decor. These pictures were taken, by the way, before the ACME...