New Broulim's opening in Ammon (Idaho Falls)

[SamSpade]

If anyone was curious about an Associated Foods member store being built from scratch, here's a link to a story about Broulim's new 50,000 sf store, opening in the Idaho Falls area.

Broulim's is a regional chain with locations all around eastern Idaho. It looks like their 10th store took a lot of cues from Harmon's.

Ammon Broulim's Opens 12/21

[SamSpade]

Opening Day. Much of the same, but some new photos to see.
Broulim's Shoppers React to Store Opening

[klkla]

Looks like a pretty nice store. Surprised to see fresh made tortillas and a Korean food truck (so to speak) in Idaho Falls.

[storewanderer]

Good looking store. Associated Food Stores is a great supplier and gives its independents a ton of support. Store design, strong center store promotional support, interesting efforts on perimeter areas (fresh tortillas and Korean food in Idaho Falls?), etc.

Unlike some wholesalers who just let their independents and even large regional customers just "rot away" if the chains can't figure out how to do everything on their own besides placing the order for the box of cake mix.

[kr.abs.swy]

This is going to be an interesting ride for Broulim's. They don't directly compete with Walmart Supercenter or WinCo in any of their markets, so they are entering a dramatically different competitive situation in Idaho Falls/Ammon. In general, Broulim's stores are all located in smaller towns where they are the only grocer (Driggs, Rigby, Afton) or where they only compete with other independents (a Food Town in Soda Springs). In Rexburg, they compete with an Albertsons and a non-Supercenter Walmart (although a Walmart Supercenter is being built on the north end of town).

That's not to say that they don't feel the impact of these companies. The Rexburg Walmart isn't a supercenter, but still sells a lot of groceries. The Shelley store is probably only a 20 minute drive from the South Idaho Falls Walmart Supercenter. Lots of people from Rexburg (and Rigby) drive to Idaho Falls to WinCo. But they are definitely jumping into a very different competitive environment. That's not to say that the store can't work -- they just are going to have to adapt their plan compared to, say, Afton.

Interestingly, the Shelley Broulim's was sold by an independent to Albertsons (somewhere in approximately 1998, give or take a year or two) and operated as an unremodeled Albertsons for a while in the 2000s before Albertsons sold it to Broulim's.

Another note, I have been told that the old location of the Rexburg Broulim's (across the street from the current location) was formerly a Safeway.