Where do you buy groceries when you live downtown?
By Doug
Moore
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Monday, Mar. 13 2006
"Where do you
shop for groceries?"
Laura Griffin, a recent downtown transplant
from the St. Louis suburbs, greets
the question with a certain
curiosity.
It has become the No. 1 question asked of downtown
residents as the long-vacant
warehouses along Washington Avenue begin
filling with loft dwellers.
"When I lived in Chesterfield, I still
drove 2 1/2 miles to the grocery store.
I didn't walk. So the question
surprises me," said Griffin, who moved to the
Printers Lofts at 16th
and Locust streets in October with her husband, Greg.
Griffin, 55,
went so far as to measure the distance her friends in Wildwood
drove
to the market. Seven miles. Ten miles. Pretty darn far away, she told her
friends in the kindest tone possible.
She is about 3 1/2 miles
from a Schnucks market on Lindell Boulevard and five
miles from
Straub's in the Central West End. Griffin can get to either in less
than 10 minutes.
Jeff Jarrett, 25, also has grown tired of
being asked where he buys groceries.
"It's a stupid question,"
Jarrett says from the Washington Avenue loft he has
called home for 2
1/2 years. "I go to the store."
He shops at Dierbergs in Brentwood
or Schnucks on Clayton Road in Richmond
Heights. Both are on the way
home from Contemporary Productions in Clayton,
where he
works.
Grocers wait and see
Retailers say downtown
continues to be looked at as a place to open a
supermarket, but the
numbers are not there - yet.
"Typically, for one of our stores, we
need in the neighborhood of 8,000
customers a week," said Paul Poe, a
spokesman for Straub's Markets. "Even
taking in parts of Lafayette
Square and parts of Soulard, the city just has not
reached the magic
number yet."
Developer Kevin McGowan talked with Straub's two years
ago about moving into
one of his buildings. While the grocer stays
away for now, the demand for
property continues to grow, he
said.
"In short, they're going to keep looking a long time,"
McGowan said. "Rent is
now twice what it was two years
ago."
Craig Heller, owner of Loftworks LLC, developed the Bell
Lofts at 10th and
Olive streets and opened City Grocers on the first
floor of the building in
October 2004.
He says one of the key
differences between downtown living and a suburban
lifestyle is
grocery shopping. In downtowns, shoppers are often walking and
buying
a few bags at a time. In the suburbs, the markets are usually bigger and
have a wider selection.
"We don't have 60,000 square feet and
30 different types of toilet paper,"
Heller said. The store measures
6,500 square feet and, on a recent visit,
carried four brands of
toilet paper.
"We don't expect people to do 100 percent of their
shopping at City Grocers,
but we want them to change buying habits and
shop with us," he said.
Heller said he believes that as more people
move downtown, other smaller
markets will open, following the steps of
larger urban areas where there is a
small market on seemingly every
corner.
Straub's is the most-talked about market moving to downtown
because its a local
company and the stores it operates measure about
12,000 square feet - easily
doable in an existing downtown building.
By comparison, Schnucks stores measure
about 60,000 square
feet.
For 15 years, Schnucks ran a 7,700-square-foot store at Ninth
and Locust
streets, next to Famous-Barr. It was housed in an old
Bettendorf-Rapp grocery
space. In 1985, when the lease came due,
Schnucks chose not to renew.
Schnucks also closed its store on Cass
Avenue north of downtown in September
2000, explaining that the chain
was losing money there.
Schnucks, like other grocers with stores in
the area, float hope but steer
clear of any commitment to move into
downtown.
"As more growth occurs, additional services will be
attracted to the area,"
said Scott Schnuck, president and CEO of
Schnuck Markets Inc. "We are watching
downtown closely."
So is
Dierbergs, a local chain that, so far, has stayed in suburban
locations.
"We are always analyzing the St. Louis market for new
store expansion and,
certainly, that is one area we continue to
study," said Robert Dierberg,
chairman and president of Dierbergs
Markets.
Equally ambiguous is Whole Foods Market, a popular Austin,
Texas, chain that
has a store in Brentwood.
"What we
specifically look for when making store-site decisions is based on a
combination of things, including the availability and cost of real
estate,
population density, education and income, and the interest in
natural and
organic foods in the area," said Whole Foods spokeswoman
Amber Cerda. "No one
factor is important, but the right combination
is.
"I'm not aware of any plans to open any stores (downtown) We do
have a team
that continuously scouts for best
opportunities."
Trader Joe's, which just opened its first store in
New York City last week, is
a newcomer to St. Louis with stores in
Brentwood, Chesterfield and Creve Coeur.
A spokesman was hesitant to
talk about what it looks for in a location. But in
that earthy,
crunchy, Southern California way that is Trader Joe's, she came
through with a laid back - although very vague -
statement.
"Trader Joe's loves St. Louis. There are a lot of
foodies there," Alison
Mochizuki said. "We consider ourselves the
neighborhood store and love to be
part of each community we open
in."
Smaller markets
could be the
answer
Residents and developers say the question about grocery
shopping is often an
excuse for people to write off downtown as a
place to live.
Matt O'Leary, senior vice president for Pyramid
Cos., a downtown developer,
said his company's goal is to knock down
the excuses that are put up to prevent
people from moving
downtown.
A bona fide supermarket is still five or 10 years off, he
said. But smaller
markets are likely to open over the next year and
will give residents variety
and convenience, he
predicted.
Downtown is a unique area, and traditional demographic
numbers should not be
used to determine whether it could support a
supermarket, O'Leary said.
In addition to the nearly 10,000
residents who live downtown, there are 90,000
office workers and 7,500
hotel rooms. These nonresidents need to be considered
when grocers and
other retailers are looking at downtown, O'Leary said.
Joe Rojek,
who works as a private banker in Clayton, is used to the
grocery-shopping question.
"They really ask it in a way that
makes me think they live in a Schnucks
parking lot," said Rojek, 30,
who moved to St. Louis from Chicago and has lived
in the downtown
Terra Cotta Lofts since February 2003.
Rojek shops at City Grocers
and the Schnucks at 4171 Lindell Boulevard, which
is being remodeled
for the first time since 1996.
Three years ago, when the loft
district started picking up speed, O'Leary, a
downtown resident, was
at his 15-year high school reunion. The first 14 people
he chatted
with all asked where he shopped for groceries.
It's a question he
can't avoid and does answer. But don't ask O'Leary where he
went to
high school - the universal question asked of all St.
Louians
who grew up here.
"I refuse to answer that," O'Leary
says.
dmoore@post-dispatch.com
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