Constantino’s Market
The much delayed Constantino’s Market is finally opening today, so say the sign on the front door. This is supposed to be the first real grocery store in the Warehouse District (6th Street Market vaguely holds that title but seems to be more a storefront for a wholesale liquor distributor that just happens to have groceries near their expiry dates for sale) and will be a welcome addition to the area. It’s also a sign that the Warehouse District has matured enough to support such an establishment, instead of the relatively transient patrons of the bars and restaurants prevelant in the District. No longer do we have to schlepp out to Lakewood just because we realized — too late! — that we’re short of butter for a given recipe.
At about noon today, they have the doors open, but they’re still working on putting on the finishing touches (e.g., price stickers, shelf stocking, turning on cash registers). There were about a dozen people walking around to get a feel for the store in this pre-opening phase. This initial interest is a good sign for the store’s future: I want them to succeed, if only because it’ll make our lives easier.
It seems to be a fairly nifty store. There’s produce, meat, dairy and so on, in neat displays. The deli section is fairly large for a store that size, so prepared foods is expected to be a big item. There’s a good selection of pastries in the Bakery section, though little daily bread on display as of yet. There’s also a section that I’ll call “gifts”, which has a small greeting card display and a lot of well-wrapped boxes of chocolates, dried fruits and so on. Wine and beer sections look decent, though this matters very little to me. The cheese cooler is a bit dinky, but seems to have a good variety. There’s a small pharmacy section, with the usual selection of aspirin, mouthwash and antacid tablets found in every small deli in the world.
Prices (at least the tags that were visible) seem OK: about the same as Tops or a bit higher. Chicken stock was the same as Tops, butter was more expensive, and milk slightly cheaper (granted, for the big grocery chains, you also get frequent buyer discounts). The intention wouldn’t be to do bulk shopping there, but this would be fine for emergency items or lazy shopping.
The best store analogy I have would be Garden of Eden in New York rather than a Westside Markets. The store, in fact, very much resembles a small, less densely packed Garden of Eden.
I may stop there later tonight, as I actually am out of butter.