The Market Report

Food Bazaar Supermarket Opened: October 4, 2024 Owner:  Spencer An Previous Tenants:  Grand Union (closed 2001) > Stop & Shop (2001-2024) Cooperative:  none Location:  675 Paterson Ave, Carlstadt, NJ Photographed:  December 15, 2024 Time for another update at two of the Food Bazaar stores acquired from Stop & Shop this past fall! The Carlstadt store's renovation is moving right along, while Pisctataway's hasn't really started yet. As we have previously seen, Carlstadt's exterior has been painted, but the interior work is progressing too. (See here for my most recent post on Carlstadt and Piscataway, about a month ago.) Inside, Carlstadt is starting to look much more like a Food Bazaar than a Stop & Shop, though the majority of the fixtures and layout remain. But the flooring has been switched to polished concrete throughout, and the ceiling and walls have gotten a fresh paint job. While I do generally like the dark ceiling, here it results in th...

Market Basket Opened: ca. 1990 Owner:  DeMoulas family Previous Tenants:  none Cooperative:  none Location:  130 Water St, Fitchburg, MA Photographed:  April 7, 2023 This is a relatively older Market Basket, but of course, within Market Basket everything is relative. This store only goes back about 30 years (possibly slightly more, but it opened as a new-build around 1990 on the side of a former mill building). Still, the 62,000 square foot supermarket is the newer of the two Market Baskets in Fitchburg. Also of note: Fitchburg has only two supermarkets, and both are Market Baskets. Leominster, just south, has two Hannafords , a Market Basket , and a natural food store . There's another Hannaford right outside Fitchburg, which we'll see shortly. In a typical Market Basket layout, dairy is in the first aisle on the right side. Seafood and deli are at the back of the first aisle, with meat on the rest of the back wall. Produce and frozen are on the left side with...

Lopez Market Opened: 2021 Owner:  Mario Lopez Contreras Previous Tenants:  Romano's Market (1903-2020) Cooperative:  none Location:  138 Harvard St, Fitchburg, MA Photographed:  April 7, 2023 Romano's Market stood on the corner of Harvard and Fulton Streets in a residential neighborhood of Fitchburg for over 100 years. It opened back in 1903, staying in business all the way through 2020. Here's an article from the local paper on the store's closure (behind a paywall), a column in the Telegram & Gazette about it, and a picture of Romano's shortly after it closed. But the tiny, 1200 square foot store is still operating as a grocery store -- now as Lopez Market, which opened in 2021. Inside, it looks a lot like Romano's did , and it's seriously old-school but seems to be kept up nicely. We're a couple blocks outside of downtown Fitchburg here, but there's a large supermarket right in the middle of Fitchburg we're touring tomorrow!

Original Grocery Tenant: unknown Address: 1334 Water St, Fitchburg, MA Opened:  unknown Closed:  unknown Later Tenants:  Caribbean International Market (1996-ca. 2017) Photographed:  April 7, 2023 About half a mile north of yesterday's Hannaford is this former corner grocer, which operated from 1996 until about 2017 as the Caribbean International Market. The store was just 2300 square feet, and judging by the look of it, I wouldn't be surprised if it was a grocer for many decades before Caribbean International Market was here. So far, it's been vacant since Caribbean International moved out. Tomorrow we're heading up towards downtown Fitchburg for a similar small store that's still in business!