365 opens a location in Austin area

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SamSpade
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365 opens a location in Austin area

Post by SamSpade »

Apparently Texans need "full service meat" or the concept is seeing that as feedback from Silver Lake (CA), Lake Oswego (OR), Bellevue (WA). Noticed today they have already cut an hour of operations off at the Lake Oswego store. I still don't understand the placement to this day. It is on a very busy highway corridor that serves SW Portland, Lake Oswego *and* West Linn though, so maybe that was the thought.
WATCH: Go inside the new 365 by Whole Foods in Cedar Park

Austin American-Statesman also links to offsite reports about the Albertsons speculation (see non-region specific thread for more on that).
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Re: 365 opens a location in Austin area

Post by pseudo3d »

SamSpade wrote:Apparently Texans need "full service meat" or the concept is seeing that as feedback from Silver Lake (CA), Lake Oswego (OR), Bellevue (WA). Noticed today they have already cut an hour of operations off at the Lake Oswego store. I still don't understand the placement to this day. It is on a very busy highway corridor that serves SW Portland, Lake Oswego *and* West Linn though, so maybe that was the thought.
WATCH: Go inside the new 365 by Whole Foods in Cedar Park

Austin American-Statesman also links to offsite reports about the Albertsons speculation (see non-region specific thread for more on that).
No major supermarket (Randalls, Kroger, H-E-B) in Texas can get away with a full service meat counter, unless you're Walmart, and even then, Texas was heavily hit with Neighborhood Market (not just Express) closures. Besides, Austin is Whole Foods' hometown.
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Re: 365 opens a location in Austin area

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:Texas was heavily hit with Neighborhood Market (not just Express) closures.
Texas only lost 5 Neighborhood Market stores. Considering that they currently operate 100 around the state, I wouldn't call that 'heavily hit'. During the 2016 closures, only a handful of Neighborhood Market stores were even closed, and most of those were just in the wrong place.

WFM opening a 365 in Austin makes sense, so they can have a lab of sorts near their headquarters, if they stay after the 'strategic initiatives' play out.
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Re: 365 opens a location in Austin area

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote:
pseudo3d wrote:Texas was heavily hit with Neighborhood Market (not just Express) closures.
Texas only lost 5 Neighborhood Market stores. Considering that they currently operate 100 around the state, I wouldn't call that 'heavily hit'. During the 2016 closures, only a handful of Neighborhood Market stores were even closed, and most of those were just in the wrong place.

WFM opening a 365 in Austin makes sense, so they can have a lab of sorts near their headquarters, if they stay after the 'strategic initiatives' play out.
OK, maybe I was thinking of the exceptions rather than the rules. I think that Austin will continue to be the home of WFM (fairly business-friendly state, flagship store, founding city), though. The biggest threat that WFM faces in Austin is Central Market, which was cultivated in Austin as well, as well as H-E-B's other stores, and Randalls (built on the foundations that the original Safeway built, as well as Tom Thumb, which I believe I read they bought into via a smaller grocer), which is in better shape in Austin than its Houston district.
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