Jungle Jim

Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. No non-grocery posts.
klkla
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Jungle Jim

Post by klkla »

Has anyone been in one of their stores? Looks pretty interesting (to say the least):
https://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/jungle- ... LAqdrJkp0g
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by pseudo3d »

They only have two locations, the second one (as linked) was the site of the former bigg's Place Mall, a mini-mall anchored by bigg's hypermarket. I've heard the international foods selection is expansive but normal center-store groceries are overpriced.
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by klkla »

It's worth looking at all those Yelp photos and the reviews. Looks like an interesting and fun place to shop. Didn't really see too many complaints about center store pricing but I assume most people shopping there to find new and interesting products displayed in an interesting environment.
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by storewanderer »

This is a great way to compete with Kroger in its home market. Have a unique, fun looking store, filled with a vast mix of unique products ranging from ethnic, regional, to local. The photos of these stores are full of personality and despite the physical plant looking pretty lousy (cement floors and warehouse looking), they still look like a fun, exciting place to shop that would be full of surprises.

It is also good for stores like this to be in Kroger's headquarters backyard, given these stores are unique and interesting, and I suspect, very high volume. I am sure Kroger watches this operation closely and there are probably a lot of ideas to lift.

Compare that to the types of competitors operating near Pleasanton and Boise and maybe one can see how certain large publicly traded chains previously based in those two places became very complacent over time...
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by arizonaguy »

storewanderer wrote:This is a great way to compete with Kroger in its home market. Have a unique, fun looking store, filled with a vast mix of unique products ranging from ethnic, regional, to local. The photos of these stores are full of personality and despite the physical plant looking pretty lousy (cement floors and warehouse looking), they still look like a fun, exciting place to shop that would be full of surprises.

It is also good for stores like this to be in Kroger's headquarters backyard, given these stores are unique and interesting, and I suspect, very high volume. I am sure Kroger watches this operation closely and there are probably a lot of ideas to lift.

Compare that to the types of competitors operating near Pleasanton and Boise and maybe one can see how certain large publicly traded chains previously based in those two places became very complacent over time...
Cincinnati actually has a pretty decent grocery market.

Jungle Jim's appears to be a pretty interesting chain (I haven't actually visited one). The Krogers I've visited there are about 1/2 to a full step better merchandised and operationally than Kroger stores elsewhere. Their Hyde Park Cincinnati store had the best floral selection and deli I've ever seen in a Kroger (lots of "extras" that aren't in other Krogers).

Plus Cincinnati has Meijer, Walmart, Remke Markets, Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, The Fresh Market, Fresh Thyme, a few Marsh stores, and some very impressive liquor / party stores across the river in Kentucky.

The supermarket situation there is much better than the similarly sized Kansas City market (where my wife is from).
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by SamSpade »

storewanderer wrote:Compare that to the types of competitors operating near Pleasanton and Boise and maybe one can see how certain large publicly traded chains previously based in those two places became very complacent over time...
I can't speak to Pleasanton, but there pretty much are no competitors in Boise.
(Correction- Both Fred Meyer and Walmart have slipped into the Treasure Valley, but truly the only "neighborhood grocer" is ABS).
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote:Compare that to the types of competitors operating near Pleasanton and Boise and maybe one can see how certain large publicly traded chains previously based in those two places became very complacent over time...
Does seem to be the case in San Antonio and a lot of Florida markets, it seems like once you run everyone out of town you get to run mediocre versions of the hometown store and suffer no consequences for it (of course, there's also going to be the flagship, but not everyone lives in that part of town).
arizonaguy wrote: Cincinnati actually has a pretty decent grocery market.

Jungle Jim's appears to be a pretty interesting chain (I haven't actually visited one). The Krogers I've visited there are about 1/2 to a full step better merchandised and operationally than Kroger stores elsewhere. Their Hyde Park Cincinnati store had the best floral selection and deli I've ever seen in a Kroger (lots of "extras" that aren't in other Krogers).

Plus Cincinnati has Meijer, Walmart, Remke Markets, Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, The Fresh Market, Fresh Thyme, a few Marsh stores, and some very impressive liquor / party stores across the river in Kentucky.

The supermarket situation there is much better than the similarly sized Kansas City market (where my wife is from).
Arguably, there's very few "traditional" supermarkets. Remke (having gotten a boost from the dismantling of the former bigg's chain, closing or downsizing the hypermarket-sized stores in 2010) and the few Marsh stores qualify, but otherwise you have the superstores (Meijer, Walmart), or the specialty stores (Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, Fresh Market, Fresh Thyme).
SamSpade wrote: I can't speak to Pleasanton, but there pretty much are no competitors in Boise.
(Correction- Both Fred Meyer and Walmart have slipped into the Treasure Valley, but truly the only "neighborhood grocer" is ABS).
WinCo also is in Boise (they're HQ'd there too).
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by BillyGr »

Not certain, but the way the map is designed (particularly the one "main pathway" shown by the dotted line taking you around the whole store), it looks like it could be something similar to the small Stew Leonard's chain found in the CT/NYC area.
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by storewanderer »

Okay, I got to go to Jingle Jim. Words cannot describe my 2+ hour visit to the store located east of Cincinnati. I guess that was the former Bigg's. The store is Supervalu supplied. Very well staffed, I found employees in many of the international foods aisles and the perimeter areas were all very heavily staffed. The "conventional" US Supermarket Aisles were not staffed.

I would highly recommend this store to anyone within a couple hours of Cincinnati. Even to people not interested in stores, this place is worth spending a couple hours and finding some interesting products to try.

The store opened up into the very expansive international foods department. These areas were organized by country. Mix was very deep. Prices were definitely not low on a whole. However, they had some items in large supply that were priced low and I wish I'd have brought an extra suitcase.

After that you got to the back (maybe it was the back...) corner which was interesting. It was 4-5 aisles and some wall space of various BBQ sauces and hot sauces. The mix is so large they are on the shelf organized in alphabetical order.

By this point I had noticed that the store appeared to have multiple back rooms/multiple loading docks for all of these different departments.

After this you go to a couple more International aisles, then a soda/drink area, then you get to the regular US Supermarket type aisles. The regular aisles have a very deep mix as well; I took a look for a number of "hard to find" and regional items I often have difficulty finding in most large chains and this place had all of the items. I have never seen all of these things together in one place before. I felt their pricing on center store was competitive with Kroger and they also had some pretty good promotions going on. The back wall was interesting with a giant soda display and a massive Kelloggs wall decor/big plastic images.

After that you got over to a fairly large seafood area and a meat area with dry aged beef and regular meat. There was also a large bakery counter with various items. Lots of cakes. There was also some sort of hot food counter but I didn't study it and am not sure what it sold. There was also a very large pet food/toy area and a fairly standard drug/HBA department. There was a selection large enough of Ty Beanie Babies to be its own little store. Somewhere in there was also a nutrition department. There was also a department that sold kitchen goods and such with its own cash register. Then there was a large wine bar which was very busy.

After that you got into the liquor area, which was again big enough to be its own store and had probably a dozen checkstands of its own. There was also a huge cigar room.

Right when you thought there was no more store left, and were a bit too overwhelmed then you get to the service deli and produce area. The service deli has Boar's Head and lots of it, along with usual cold salads. The produce department was fantastic with a very deep mix and surprisingly fresh products. They had a wide variety of ethnic produce like frozen durian, mamey, various asian vegetables in large quantity such as snow peas, various eggplants, etc. They also had all the usual produce including massive displays of "homegrown" honeycrisp apples and gala apples. There was also a variety of fresh cut fruit (lots of watermelon there...).

Overall this store was the best grocery store I've ever seen. The atmosphere and product mix was so unique and unlike any other I've seen before. It was truly a store that has "everything." Literally.
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Re: Jungle Jim

Post by rwsandiego »

I've wanted to visit this place for a long time, but have never gotten to Cincinnati. Is this the store that has a decommissioned Chicago 'L' car inside?
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