Retail Watchers

I was in Overland Park, KS over the weekend for a wedding and I stumbled upon a new Hy Vee store at the intersection of 95th Ave and Antioch Rd. I had to pick up something for a barbecue I was going to and I have to say that I was very impressed with the new Hy Vee prototype. This store even had a sports bar on a 2nd level (near the deli / bakery counter).

I've only been twice, but Hy Vee seems to do a good job running large, well stocked, high volume stores.

There are some high end grocery stores in some areas that have in-store restaurants. Wegman's for example has restaurants in many of their stores and they are very popular.

Hy Vee is an employee owned company. The employees have an incentive to keep their stores well run. If the company is successful then the employees make more money in stock. This really does motivate employees to work harder and take pride in their stores compared to stores where working harder doesn't pay off at all.