The University of Pennsylvania has confirmed that the Fresh Grocer that has been operating at the corner of 40th and Walnut for 15 years will soon be replaced by another operator.
In an e-mail to West Philly Local, Jennifer Rizzi, Director of Communications at Penn, confirmed that the university, which owns the building where the Fresh Grocer is currently located, “began lease discussions with a new operator and will soon announce plans with this operator for an exciting, upgraded state of the art urban supermarket at the 40th and Walnut location.” The decision to seek proposals from a variety of grocery stores for this location was made after the Fresh Grocer “failed to renew the lease for almost 4 months after the deadline [November 2015],” according to the email.
The new operator was chosen after an extensive review of all proposals, including the proposal submitted by the Fresh Grocer, according to Penn.
“The [new] store will not only feature a multi-million dollar investment to upgrade the existing facility, but will also provide industry leading wages to its employees while meeting Penn’s local employment goals,” Rizzi writes.
It was reported last month that the new operator might be Acme, but Penn hasn’t confirmed it yet. We’ll keep you posted when we have more information.
Fresh Grocer employees have been handing out flyers asking customers to support their store since last month.
January 11th, 2017 at 6:03 pm
I hope the new place doesn’t build their store on a crazy diagonal like FroGo has. Literally the hardest store to navigate/find anything at in this area.
January 12th, 2017 at 10:32 am
The salad bar has an insulting amount of protein vs. two types of lettuce + spring mix (yawn). Stranger, if I want to buy produce, I then have to double back and around the stuffing/mac n cheese aisle to get to the salad dressings. They have Kikkomen products but the prices are not fabulous. The self checkouts are WAY too loud and the instructions often slow. Customer service not nearly as friendly as Trader Joe’s and Sushi is rather mehhh. The upstairs dining area has become a hangout for vagrants, especially in the winter.