Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. No non-grocery posts.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote:May seems half hearted. I can't see much about the store's dog bone or jerky programs but see a good number of positives online about bakery/deli.
Just because it's not in the reviews doesn't mean it's not important...I know that Village Foods back in Texas had an in-house sausage program (one of the things carried over from AppleTree, which I'm sure was one of the things they developed, not Safeway) as well as an amazing rotisserie chicken, neither of which were mentioned in the small pool of Yelp reviews.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by storewanderer »

Those rotisserie chickens would be a lot better if stores just seasoned them well/properly... so many stores just take them out of the box and half heartedly sprinkle a little bit of seasoning on and then throw them in to cook and not look at them.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote:Those rotisserie chickens would be a lot better if stores just seasoned them well/properly... so many stores just take them out of the box and half heartedly sprinkle a little bit of seasoning on and then throw them in to cook and not look at them.
I have seen chain grocery stores do what you describe, and they always come out extremely greasy (almost every chain grocery I've come across--if I wanted greasy chicken, I'd go with fried chicken) but Village Foods' chicken actually marinated theirs first.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by Super S »

For what its worth, this is a much more visible location, on the way to a big Fry's Electronics which is a former Incredible Universe store. It is also in a strip mall which has a Rite Aid among other stores. The Albertsons is in a bad location, most traffic turns off to go to Fred Meyer and the Walgreens on the corner kinda hides the Albertsons from view. This move actually makes sense if the Albertsons is closing. The Lambs/Bales was an ok store, but something seemed a bit off about the place the last time I went in there about a year ago, and it seems that the Thriftway brand is disappearing.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by pseudo3d »

The Facebook page does have some notes about the store worth sharing:

- The store will be closed for two weeks, not one. I don't know how much "remodeling" will go on. The week closure for Paul's in most cases was a clean-up and store reset, though without much work (at least on the McCall store) internally.
- Kellie Poulsen-Grill mentions that "Some [employees] are staying on but most are leaving". I'm going to assume that the Albertsons employees will be replacing them, though I'm not sure if some are leaving by choice or Albertsons sacked them (usually they offer employment opportunities to bought out employees).
- I find it interesting that the only few reviews that said anything were rants against the bakery.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by pseudo3d »

Store opened this week. No good glimpse at the decor though pastry case suggests the Florida decor.

http://pamplinmedia.com/wsp/134-news/31 ... nd-opening
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by SamSpade »

While I never found a media report, Wilsonville is officially off the Albertsons.com store locator, so they must have moved to the "new" Safeway and closed Albertsons.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by SamSpade »

In case anyone cares, I was finally in this store tonight. It got colorful lifestyle decor. Aisle markers were the standard Safeway wood with a number in a red circle. Extra lighting was added to brighten the checkstands and service departments.

Missing amenities?
Starbucks
Pharmacy

Otherwise, if one had been in the Cedar Mill Bales or Aloha Bales, you could imagine the old store hiding below the new. I know Bales probably didn't remodel after buying Lambs but maybe the Thriftway co-op had certain researched / suggested layouts at one time.
Last edited by SamSpade on February 26th, 2017, 10:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by Super S »

Interesting that there is no pharmacy, although there is a Rite Aid in the same center. There must be a lease restriction. Safeway has opened many pharmacies in other shopping centers where a drug store or pharmacy already existed though...
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Re: Safeway buys Wilsonville, OR Lambs (Bales) Store

Post by pseudo3d »

Super S wrote:Interesting that there is no pharmacy, although there is a Rite Aid in the same center. There must be a lease restriction. Safeway has opened many pharmacies in other shopping centers where a drug store or pharmacy already existed though...
It's usually a lease restriction. I know a lot of the Safeway stores (later AppleTree) in the Houston area had an Eckerd either next door or in the same shopping center in lieu of a pharmacy department. My favorite Kroger in Houston that had a Walgreens in the same shopping center didn't...but the Randalls a few miles away with a Walgreens next door did, though all the previous examples were in the 1970s, and the Randalls was opened in 1996. I'd guess it's a lease restriction here. How old was it again?
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