Jesse Hameen II stopped by Shaw’s supermarket on Whalley Avenue to pick up some groceries. Six weeks from now, he may have to trek out to the suburbs to get his apple cider, zucchini, and tofu “ice-cream” bars.
Hameen was one of several customers and employees who reacted with dismay on Monday to the news that Shaw’s will close up shop by the beginning of April — and possibly deliver a recession-era hit to a struggling neighborhood economy. Over 100 jobs are at stake. So is a center of commerce for the Dwight area.
Shaw’s parent company, SuperValu, announced on Friday it’s pulling the grocery stores out of Connecticut. Of the 18 Shaw’s stores in the state, 16 are being sold — 11 to ShopRite and PriceRite, and five to Stop & Shop.
That leaves two locations that so far have no buyers. One is in Manchester. The other is on Whalley Avenue in New Haven. If a buyer doesn’t come forward to purchase the store by early April, it will close, said SuperValu spokeswoman Dina Waxman.
If the store is purchased by another grocery chain, there’s no guarantee the current workers would retain their jobs, Waxman said. “That would depend who buys it,” she said.
SuperValu decided to sell off its Connecticut Shaw’s store to allow the company to “operate more efficiently and effectively within a highly competitive retail environment,” said Pete Van Helden, a SuperValu executive, in a Friday press release.
Two months ago, a plan to open a Save-A-Lot discount grocery store just half a block away raised fears that Shaw’s would be driven out of business. When that plan was shot down by the Board of Zoning Appeals last week, it looked like Shaw’s had dodged a bullet.
Like Shaw’s, the Save-A-Lot chain is owned by SuperValu, which suggests the company may have already been planning the Shaw’s pull-out.
For over a decade, Shaw’s supermarket on Whalley Avenue has been a retail anchor in the neighborhood. It’s the only nearby full-sized supermarket in a residential neighborhood. Other area supermarkets are in suburban strip-malls, accessible only by car. The Whalley Avenue Shaw’s is in walking distance of hundreds of homes, as well as downtown and Yale; many of the shoppers don’t have cars.
The store’s placement was no accident. It was the result of a coordinated effort by a local community development agency, City Hall, Yale, and a national organization working to bring supermarkets into “underserved urban areas.”
Now the local agency, the Greater Dwight Development Corporation (GDDC), is working to help find a buyer for Shaw’s before the March 31 deadline.
“We are putting together a plan,” said Linda Townsend-Maier. She said she was reeling from Friday’s bombshell: “I’m still in shock.”
But the Shaw’s pull-out was not entirely unforeseen, she said. Rumors have floated since the store opened that Shaw’s might leave the state, she said. “It finally happened.”
The GDDC has begun talking to brokers to find a buyer, Townsend-Maier said.
She wondered aloud about SuperValu’s recent plan to open up a Save-A-Lot near the Shaw’s. “They probably knew something we didn’t know,” she said.
If no buyer is found, it would mean the loss of a lot of local jobs, Townsend-Maier said. 60 percent of Shaw’s employees are from the surrounding neighborhoods, she said.
A store closing would also be bad for local shoppers, she said. “It would mean a limited access to the foods we generally buy… It would be a big loss.”
Before Shaw’s opened, Townsend-Maier said, “We were generally buying our food from neighborhood corner stores.”
Michael Hendrix, for one, doesn’t want to go back to those days.
“I don’t like those corner stores,” Hendrix (pictured) said on his way out of Shaw’s on Monday.
Hendrix, a self-described “coupon fanatic,” said he walks to Shaw’s several times a week for the deals on groceries. “I buy whatever’s on sale.”
He said he’s not happy the store might close. “That’s bad. It’s upsetting.” With no grocery store in the neighborhood, Hendrix would have to hop a bus to pick up food. “It’d be devastating for me.”
During conversations with half a dozen Shaw’s shoppers on Monday, nearly everyone mentioned the same word: convenient.
“It’s very convenient,” said a shopper named Shannon. She was pushing a grocery cart filled with groceries and her toddler daughter. Without Shaw’s, “where do we shop?”
“It’s very convenient to have this,” said Jesse Hameen. He drives from his house to Shaw’s in eight minutes.
He said he comes for the selection of organic foods, the bargains, and the weekly specials. “I like the produce,” he said.
Shaw’s is the only supermarket accessible by Yale, he noted. Maybe the university should subsidize the store, he suggested. “I’m not kidding.”
Michelle Greene was shocked Shaw’s might close. “This don’t make no sense. Now we have nothing.”
She said she could go to Stop & Shop, but she prefers the prices at Shaw’s. “I’m disappointed.”
More than the prices, Greene likes the community feeling she finds at Shaw’s. “I know all the cashiers,” she said. She knows when they’ve been on vacation and hugs them when they come back, Greene said.
Over by the store’s exit, one of those cashiers was just back from vacation, and taking a smoke break. She didn’t mince words when asked about the news of Shaw’s impending demise. “It sucks.”
The cashier — who asked that her name not be used — said she came in one day last week during her vacation and thought someone had died. “Everybody had a real sad look on their face.”
The 53-year-old cashier has worked at Shaw’s for three years. She walks to work. “A good half of us walk,” she said. She had no other job prospects, she said.
“I feel horrible too,” said another employee. He has collected shopping carts from the parking lot for eight years. He and his wife — a bagger — walk to work from the Monterey Place housing development. “What can we do?”
“We need jobs,” said a front-end manager. “The economy’s messed up.” She said she’s been telling customers to call the mayor and ask him to help save the store.
The front-end manager and the cashier both said they didn’t know why no one seemed to want to buy the store. It’s always busy, they said. Especially during the first week of the month, the cashier added.
The front-end manager said the workers’ union only just found out about the closing. She said she didn’t know if the workers’ jobs would be protected if another grocery store chain buys the location.