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Downtown Grocery Store List (current + proposed)

Just a rebranding of the existing Sobeys, it would seem.

It is a rebranding of the existing Sobeys; though there will be a reno of some kind, as per standard the non-food aisle will be gone (laundry soap, TP etc.); expect more meals-to-go. Not sure if they'll try to do this in pieces at night or with a closure.

I can't say whether there will be one closer to Y-B (really don't know), but with 5 supermarkets in close proximity (Eataly, Bloor St, Pusateri's, McEwan and Longo's) I wouldn't think it all that likely, at least right at the corner.

But there will be several more Toronto stores, that are not yet announced, almost all of which will be open by late 2022.
 
It is a rebranding of the existing Sobeys; though there will be a reno of some kind, as per standard the non-food aisle will be gone (laundry soap, TP etc.); expect more meals-to-go. Not sure if they'll try to do this in pieces at night or with a closure.

I can't say whether there will be one closer to Y-B (really don't know), but with 5 supermarkets in close proximity (Eataly, Bloor St, Pusateri's, McEwan and Longo's) I wouldn't think it all that likely, at least right at the corner.

But there will be several more Toronto stores, that are not yet announced, almost all of which will be open by late 2022.
I would assume a closure to redo the College Park Sobey's. They're going to want customers to know this is not a mere rebranding, but a different store, and you don't accomplish that overnight.

42
 
T&T has finally publicly confirmed what many of us have known for some time, that the Cherry St. location is closing; and it has given us the date:

January 30th, 2020 is the end.

They will apparently have an online shopping option up and running before then, but no replacement downtown store.

They suggest they are actively looking for a new downtown location (one might wonder why this wasn't being done actively 2 years ago or more)....

But no confirmed spot, or timeline for opening.

BlogTo article: https://www.blogto.com/eat_drink/20...t-closing-its-only-downtown-toronto-location/
 
Ok, so this Longo's is growing on me.

They're super wasteful with produce, so I get most of my produce now from their discount cart which is located by the back and nowhere near the produce, for good reason.
They're basically giving it away for free. Perfectly good veggies and fruit. Ten tomatoes, brand new, 1.50$.
Ten organice lemons, brand new, 1.50$
Four massive yellow peppers, brand new, 3$

It's messed up.

I also love the car park. It's fresh to death....not as fresh as the produce they're ready to throw out though.
 
I'm sure they've been looking. It's just they won't be able to find somewhere downtown with cheap enough rent for their low margin business model.

As for the online shopping option, didn't they already partner with InstaCart?

Oh NO! As @Northern Light says, it was clear this store was going to have to close for the past few years so why T&T were not looking at alternate locations is a bit of a mystery.
 
They're basically giving it away for free. Perfectly good veggies and fruit. Ten tomatoes, brand new, 1.50$.
Ten organice lemons, brand new, 1.50$
Four massive yellow peppers, brand new, 3$

It's messed up.
Could this be a predatory pricing strategy targeting Organic Garage on Hanna Ave?
 
Could this be a predatory pricing strategy targeting Organic Garage on Hanna Ave?

Why just Organic Garage? Surely Metro as well.

I don't know, but I think they're taking their "fresh" produce mantra too far. Works for me, but if they're throwing out perfectly good produce then someone at Longo's needs to get shipped to some forsaken island in the middle of the Pacific with just a box of matches and a dull knife.
 
I would assume a closure to redo the College Park Sobey's. They're going to want customers to know this is not a mere rebranding, but a different store, and you don't accomplish that overnight.

42

It believe I saw that they will be closing on Jan. 30. In the meantime, they don't seem to be replenishing their shelves. The merchandise is quite sparse.
 
Outside of downtown but Bruno's Fine Foods are opening its 4th location in the GTA. It'll be at the NW corner of Queen St East & Woodbine in the Beaches area.


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Why just Organic Garage? Surely Metro as well.

I don't know, but I think they're taking their "fresh" produce mantra too far. Works for me, but if they're throwing out perfectly good produce then someone at Longo's needs to get shipped to some forsaken island in the middle of the Pacific with just a box of matches and a dull knife.

I always thought that when raw fresh produce approached a point two to four days out from going bad that it was used by the store for the prepared meals, catering, or the salad bar. I hope that's true. Do they make the prepared meals locally in each store, or is it in a centralised kitchen somewhere and then distributed as needed?
 
I always thought that when raw fresh produce approached a point two to four days out from going bad that it was used by the store for the prepared meals, catering, or the salad bar. I hope that's true. Do they make the prepared meals locally in each store, or is it in a centralised kitchen somewhere and then distributed as needed?

Short answer, it depends.

Long answer:

- Discount grocers for the major chains don't generally have any equipment or staff or space for preparing veg or meat, typically everything is pre-packaged before it reaches them.

- The exception is that they have their own trays and plastic wrap which you see used to wrap old fruit/peppers etc. when they are marked for immediate sale on discount.

- There are some exceptions in larger stores where certain functions (ie. butcher) may be contracted out to a third party; but then that third party has no right to access other corporate stock or to place their product in any form on shelving or in fridges not part of their lease.

- A-line grocers or 'conventional' stores (Metro, Loblaws, Sobeys etc.) do prepare salads and some 'chopped' products like onion/carrot/celery or cut fruit you may see on offer for sale; they may also have some ability to use damaged fruit to make juices.

They generally cannot use material from meat or produce in prepared meals at all.

This has as much to do w/the fact that those departments require predictable supplies to put the same things out every day, and so order their own supplies and have their own walk-in fridges etc. as anything else.

That said, most stores don't employ chefs or restaurant managers, which means means corporate is pretty worried about idiot-proofing against someone's poor judgement into what is savable and how it must be cleaned or prepared.

FarmBoy is an exception to this, where their prepared foods department will use overstock or end-of-life product from other departments, but they still don't do it as much as you might hope.

A lot of stuff on the FarmBoy hotbar is currently made in Ottawa and trucked in every morning.

There are a few spots specifically for house-made product.

But it's not a huge amount, and again they have dedicated supplies of their own as well.

Whole Foods also used to repurpose, I'm not sure the current state of their program, as they're third-party sourcing a lot of their prepared foods these days as well.

In the end, the answer is that far too much stuff gets chucked; some gets 'saved' some of the time, depending on the store.
 
So, Jacked Up Coffee's espresso was pretty weak. It was like Starbucks-ish. 5/10
I looked into this because Jacked Up is usually top notch (in terms of Melbourne/Oslo standards). The truck that used to be parked outside the LV West Elm is the one that moved to Metro Hall about a year ago. The one now in Longos is a new third truck.
 

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