Yesterday, I stopped into the most recently remodeled Safeway in the Phoenix area to check out the interior.
It is mostly the same as other Safeway "lifestyle" interiors.
However, there are two main changes.
1,) The aisle signage is mounted perpendicular to the aisleways and of a rectangular design:
2.) There is a "stay healthy / live well" area directly in front of the pharmacy that resembles more of the arrangement of a drug store (such as CVS or Walgreens) than it does a supermarket. Furthermore the displays in here seem to be illuminated by LED lights:
The new aisle signs are nothing new. Safeway has been using them on new stores for the past few years.
The over the counter medication section seems to be an interesting change. Drugstores such as CVS have been lighting their products with lights for several years. It draws attention and increases sales of items. It looks cool for some items such as vibrantly colored shampoos and other fancy products.
The problem with LED lighting is that it is sometimes too white and too harsh. When the new Safeway near me suffered from a computer malfunction, the LED lighting all over the store turned off. The store had electricity, but the LED lights would not turn on due to a computer malfunction. The refrigerated cases and all of the LED lighting was dark. It was awful. The gas station even lost the LED gas prices. To this day the LED gas sign is still broken. They put up temporary signs by the road, but it still looks tacky.
LED lights will not solve Safeway's challenges moving drug/gm items. Decreasing the prices of these items and improving the selection, and getting more private label items in, will. Their mix is very limited, about on par with Save Mart's mix in NorCal but better than Raleys mix in NorCal. Ralphs probably has a similar lousy mix at outrageous pricing, or did last time I was in a Ralphs, but the other Kroger divisions have a much better mix of drug, at much stronger prices (notably Smiths, Frys, and King Soopers).
I've seen a few of these "remodels" Safeway is doing and I think they need to do more, a lot more...
Safeway's drugstore items are very limited in most of their stores. Some stores that do not have pharmacies barely even have part of one aisle that is devoted to drugstore items. The prices are not good, and the only reason why people would even bother buying those items is if it is late at night and all drugstores nearby are closed. I have seen some former Albertsons stores Northern California that were converted to Lucky stores still retain huge drugstore sections. Those stores have drugstore departments that are huge and have even better selections than Safeway. Even after the Northern California Lucky stores switched from Equaline to TopCare products, the drugstore section still has a huge selection of generic drugstore items.
Save Mart has improved its drug mix in the past year or so. Or maybe they are just restocking better. They are also reducing shelving (shortening aisles in length and height). Their drug pricing seems just as bad if not worse than Safeway due to lack of sale/promotion. Their prices on drug items are terrible compared to Smiths, which has very strong pricing on the drug category. Albertsons was far better on price on drug, though honestly, Albertsons was better on price on almost everything (maybe not produce)...
Let's go over my grocery purchases tonight (from Smiths):
I bought a 3pk of Orval Popcorn, I did not think it was a very good deal at 2.88 ("new low price was 3.39) but over at Save Mart this popcorn was "on sale" for 3.39 with a regular price of 3.99. Ouch. I also bought a tin of Kroger Peanuts this was regular 2.99 and sale 1.67. Over at Save Mart for Sunny Select Peanuts same size "on sale 2.99" regular 3.19. I also bought some tea bags (Celestial brand), these at Smiths regular price 2.49. At Save Mart, regular price 3.69. Frozen Lean Cuisine Meals at Smiths are regular price 3.17 sale price 2.00. Over at Save Mart same items are regular price 3.79 and sale price 3.29. And Smiths has a coupon in their ad for $2 off 5 so that's even better As much as I'd love to give Save Mart the business, it is closer to my house, between the awful pricing and lousy selection, it just is like a losing battle for that chain. If there was no Smiths I'd just go buy groceries at WinCo, Target, or Wal Mart.
The recent remodel at the Safeway in Phoenix brings notable changes, especially in aisle signage and store layout. The perpendicular placement of rectangular aisle signage aims for enhanced visibility and easier navigation, streamlining the shopping experience. The introduction of a dedicated "stay healthy/live well" area resembling a drug store setup near the pharmacy aligns with the trend of offering health-focused sections within supermarkets. The use of LED lights to illuminate displays in this section highlights Safeway's commitment to modern, energy-efficient solutions while emphasizing the importance of health and wellness offerings. These alterations reflect Safeway's efforts to create a more accessible and health-conscious shopping environment for its customers.
Safeway has added led lighting to its candy and over the counter medications over the past several years. The drug sections in some stores have lower shelves for better visibility along with the dark wood shelves that match the dark wood Lifestyle Pharmacy.
The Florida decor often keeps the dark wood shelves as the Florida decor has dark brown wood on the walls around the department signs.
Some smaller Safeway stores don't have the lower medication shelves. They just have a single aisle of medications with regular height shelves.
pegers wrote: ↑January 1st, 2024, 1:22 pm
The recent remodel at the Safeway in Phoenix brings notable changes, especially in aisle signage and store layout. The perpendicular placement of rectangular aisle signage aims for enhanced visibility and easier navigation, streamlining the shopping experience. The introduction of a dedicated "stay healthy/live well" area resembling a drug store setup near the pharmacy aligns with the trend of offering health-focused sections within supermarkets. The use of LED lights to illuminate displays in this section highlights Safeway's commitment to modern, energy-efficient solutions while emphasizing the importance of health and wellness offerings. These alterations reflect Safeway's efforts to create a more accessible and health-conscious shopping environment for its customers.
The first store I saw that had these features goes all the way back to 2015 in the new build Carlsbad/La Costa Vons.
Not sure how recent any of this is, but the hanging sign frame over wellness and the other such signs (weird cube boxes hanging throughout frozen) were all being ripped out during Colorful Lifestyle, Lifestyle Repaint, and Modern Decor remodels. They leave the LED lit shelves in some cases, but in others they yank out these short dark fixtures and go right back to regular tall gondolas. The aisle hangers are about 7 years old now and still haven't made it to the entire chain; I've seen lifestyle repaint stores that still didn't switch to the Albertsons style perpendicular signs. There are three versions (at least), the red box sign, the street sign that is used in Modern decor and was first seen in the short lived Safeway Florida project, and the teal circle sign from the Pavilions format. I don't particularly care for them and would rather see Albertsons (Safeway) go back to triangular signs but more similar to Kroger where you can see everything in the aisle from multiple angles.
pegers wrote: ↑January 1st, 2024, 1:22 pm
The recent remodel at the Safeway in Phoenix brings notable changes, especially in aisle signage and store layout. The perpendicular placement of rectangular aisle signage aims for enhanced visibility and easier navigation, streamlining the shopping experience. The introduction of a dedicated "stay healthy/live well" area resembling a drug store setup near the pharmacy aligns with the trend of offering health-focused sections within supermarkets. The use of LED lights to illuminate displays in this section highlights Safeway's commitment to modern, energy-efficient solutions while emphasizing the importance of health and wellness offerings. These alterations reflect Safeway's efforts to create a more accessible and health-conscious shopping environment for its customers.
The first store I saw that had these features goes all the way back to 2015 in the new build Carlsbad/La Costa Vons.
Not sure how recent any of this is, but the hanging sign frame over wellness and the other such signs (weird cube boxes hanging throughout frozen) were all being ripped out during Colorful Lifestyle, Lifestyle Repaint, and Modern Decor remodels. They leave the LED lit shelves in some cases, but in others they yank out these short dark fixtures and go right back to regular tall gondolas. The aisle hangers are about 7 years old now and still haven't made it to the entire chain; I've seen lifestyle repaint stores that still didn't switch to the Albertsons style perpendicular signs. There are three versions (at least), the red box sign, the street sign that is used in Modern decor and was first seen in the short lived Safeway Florida project, and the teal circle sign from the Pavilions format. I don't particularly care for them and would rather see Albertsons (Safeway) go back to triangular signs but more similar to Kroger where you can see everything in the aisle from multiple angles.
There were actually some Canada Stores that got those drug upgrades and those signs.
That was the last of the US programs that Canada saw.
