Kroger opening new stores in metroplex

Kroger to build new Marketplace stores throughout metroplex, 10:21 AM CT

10:43 AM CST on Tuesday, November 10, 2009
By MARIA HALKIAS / The Dallas Morning News
mhalkias@dallasnews.com

Kroger plans to build one of its 123,000-square foot grocery and general merchandise stores in Tarrant County’s Alliance Town Center.

Other planned locations are Fort Worth and Frisco Kroger Marketplace is scheduled to open late next year in the north Fort Worth shopping center that is a joint development of Dallas-based Hillwood and Fort Worth-based Trademark.

A Kroger Marketplace is under construction in Frisco and is scheduled to open in January. Kroger recently opened a Marketplace store in Houston, has one more planned there for next year.

The bigger stores are Kroger’s answer to the competition traditional supermarkets face from Wal-Mart Supercenters and SuperTarget stores and introduce Kroger’s jewelry brand, Fred Meyer Jeweler, to the Texas market. The stores have fuel centers in the parking lot and drive-through pharmacies.

In addition to expanded grocery, deli, floral, organic, gourmet and chef-prepared foods, the store will have a wine shop. Its general merchandise categories are bed, bath, kitchen, tabletop, and an Ashley branded furniture department.

The 300-acre Alliance Town Center is located along the east side of Interstate 35W between North Tarrant Parkway and Heritage Trace Parkway.

J.C. Penney was the first retailer to open in the shopping center in 2005 and since then several stores have been added including Sam Moon Trading Co., Belk, Best Buy and Hobby Lobby. Other stores under construction are Rooms To Go, BJ’s Restaurant and Brewhouse, Freebirds World Burrito and Kirkland’s.

The center is surrounded by new housing developments and is near Alliance Global Logistics Hub.

Wal-Mart owns the land on the north service road just west of 548. They tried to get a chain grocer to come in an build at hwy53 and 2642 but Wal-Mart owning that piece of land scared everyone away. Wal-Mart has said this year that they are waiting to build a super-center on that land when TEXDOT rebuilds the two I-30 overpasses at some point.

Great excuse. Lets see how long it will be for the state of tx to build a bridge. enviromental studies, budgets, cost breakdowns, bidding.....maybe 10-20 years from now. Guess I better go to rockwall and get some milk or buy me a cow.

RC Fisherman wrote:

Wal-Mart owns the land on the north service road just west of 548. They tried to get a chain grocer to come in an build at hwy53 and 2642 but Wal-Mart owning that piece of land scared everyone away. Wal-Mart has said this year that they are waiting to build a super-center on that land when TEXDOT rebuilds the two I-30 overpasses at some point.

Royse City will never get a grocery store under the current administration. They are a bunch of Backward Bubba's who do not have a clue.

Acquiring a Grocery store is not limited to the current administration, if you know anyway to get it done then go for it or shut the floyd up.

Squirrell wrote:

Acquiring a Grocery store is not limited to the current administration, if you know anyway to get it done then go for it or shut the floyd up.

Tell us what our EDC has done to attract a grocery??????????

They have offered everything in the book the law allows. Free land, an agreement to let them recover their full investment by keeping a part of their sales tax, you name it they have done it. Now tell me in John Kennedy's words "Ask not what EDC has done for you but what have you done for EDC?" If you know some great secret way to get a grocery store here and you don't share it with the powers to be then you alone are the reason we don't have a grocery store.

Squirrell wrote:

They have offered everything in the book the law allows. Free land, an agreement to let them recover their full investment by keeping a part of their sales tax, you name it they have done it. Now tell me in John Kennedy's words "Ask not what EDC has done for you but what have you done for EDC?" If you know some great secret way to get a grocery store here and you don't share it with the powers to be then you alone are the reason we don't have a grocery store.

Come on Squirrely, free land, give me a break. What land has the EDC got in its pocket it could possibly give a way? All of the prime land I know of is owned by either Investment Firms or the Crowell’s.

Squirrell wrote:

They have offered everything in the book the law allows. Free land, an agreement to let them recover their full investment by keeping a part of their sales tax, you name it they have done it. Now tell me in John Kennedy's words "Ask not what EDC has done for you but what have you done for EDC?" If you know some great secret way to get a grocery store here and you don't share it with the powers to be then you alone are the reason we don't have a grocery store.

We have enough liars in the world... Squirrell, please spare us your BS!!!

I'm afraid most of the people on here are right when it comes to the honest effort that has been put forth for a Community Grocery Store of any kind. I realize that our EDC has tried several baiting tactics to attract a grocery store, but when those were exhausted, then why didn't we try something else. You ask for more ideas...heres a couple more. Don't know if they will work, but it would be worth a try. Instead of using Royse City only to attract something, how about combining efforts with Fate, Caddo Mills and Community? Don't forget we have Union Valley with 40 or 50 folks that might want to contribute "efforts and ideas" to a consolidated Grocery Store. Why wouldn't you want to take 5 town Mayors on a mission to find someone to service us all?
Here's another idea. Appoint an active committee, not like any other you have already had. That committee of "citizens", especially the ones that come on here should be on that committee. "EVERY SINGLE" City Council meeting would begin with a report on progress or a step back on attracting a store or at least documenting some sort of effort, if it were only one time a month. I would think the City could consider an amount to at least reimburse for expenses, to sustain the committee. You know a lot of times if you just get a nibble, the next thing you get is a big bite. Most of any idea begins with hard work. If you want it bad enough, it can be done.

Lex wrote:

I'm afraid most of the people on here are right when it comes to the honest effort that has been put forth for a Community Grocery Store of any kind. I realize that our EDC has tried several baiting tactics to attract a grocery store, but when those were exhausted, then why didn't we try something else. You ask for more ideas...heres a couple more. Don't know if they will work, but it would be worth a try. Instead of using Royse City only to attract something, how about combining efforts with Fate, Caddo Mills and Community? Don't forget we have Union Valley with 40 or 50 folks that might want to contribute "efforts and ideas" to a consolidated Grocery Store. Why wouldn't you want to take 5 town Mayors on a mission to find someone to service us all?
Here's another idea. Appoint an active committee, not like any other you have already had. That committee of "citizens", especially the ones that come on here should be on that committee. "EVERY SINGLE" City Council meeting would begin with a report on progress or a step back on attracting a store or at least documenting some sort of effort, if it were only one time a month. I would think the City could consider an amount to at least reimburse for expenses, to sustain the committee. You know a lot of times if you just get a nibble, the next thing you get is a big bite. Most of any idea begins with hard work. If you want it bad enough, it can be done.

Lex,

You bring up some good strategies.

EDC is the group of citizens who are working on the grocery store idea. Their meetings are open to the public and input is more than welcome. Their agendas (meeting times) are posted on the bulletin board in front of city hall.Their regular meeting times are the fourth Thursday at & pm at City Hall. This is for RC Retire, if you owned 40 acres on the highway that you wanted to develop, wouldn't you realize that if you gave say 7 acres to a grocery store that you would get rich selling the rest to stores that all want to open up close to the grocery store.

Good thought, Lex! I've been wondering if a co-op grocery might not be possible. Maybe manned by a rotation of part time volunteers. Say delivery and pick-ups by members...oh, twice a week. Texas has a lot of other co-ops - why not a community groocery? Perhaps it could be organized so as to become "for profit" at such time as it became self-sustaining. The volunteers could have an option to become owners, converting time served into shares. I know it might be complicated, but there don't seem to be a lot of viable options. Joe's Meat Market is not very inspired - canned goods and not-too-fresh produce. Family Dollar is built on a cookie-cutter model and not likely to become a real grocer any time soon.
Not suggesting a co-operative is the only option, but I'm not clear on many others, short of somebody coming up with enough capital for an independent grocery.
Endless complaints about how nobody else does anything are annoying, especially considering that the usual complainers don't do ANYTHING and can be relied upon to try to stop anyone else from accomplishing anything, too. It might put them out of "business".

You need to check out the Angel Food program from the First United Methodist Church. Jana Hebron from Jana's gym heads it up. Great food for a great price.

Thanks, I know Jana and about the Angel Food program, but what I'm talking about is a remedy for ordinary people who don't want to drive to Rockwall or Greenville for groceries, not about a charity for those who can't afford food. Umm, actually that may include most of us, but that's another matter.
What I was suggesting was more or less a community grocery, but with pre-ordered items and those items we all need (toilet paper comes to mind). They could be combined with the needs of other members to acquire the quantities often required in order to obtain decent prices at Sam's, Costco, or central produce outlets. It would mean that not everyone would need to drive and endure the shopping marathon every week. We'd have to pay just slightly more in order to cover overhead, but not a lot, I suspect. Details, details...anyone think this might work? I'm just trying out one possibility to resolve one of the bigest issues we all share. I'll drop it like the proverbial sizzling spud if nobody is interested.

Gee, can't spell today..."biggest"

DPD wrote:

Thanks, I know Jana and about the Angel Food program, but what I'm talking about is a remedy for ordinary people who don't want to drive to Rockwall or Greenville for groceries, not about a charity for those who can't afford food. Umm, actually that may include most of us, but that's another matter.
What I was suggesting was more or less a community grocery, but with pre-ordered items and those items we all need (toilet paper comes to mind). They could be combined with the needs of other members to acquire the quantities often required in order to obtain decent prices at Sam's, Costco, or central produce outlets. It would mean that not everyone would need to drive and endure the shopping marathon every week. We'd have to pay just slightly more in order to cover overhead, but not a lot, I suspect. Details, details...anyone think this might work? I'm just trying out one possibility to resolve one of the bigest issues we all share. I'll drop it like the proverbial sizzling spud if nobody is interested.

May be we can get the Salvation Army to set up quarters downtown.

DPD wrote:

Thanks, I know Jana and about the Angel Food program, but what I'm talking about is a remedy for ordinary people who don't want to drive to Rockwall or Greenville for groceries, not about a charity for those who can't afford food. Umm, actually that may include most of us, but that's another matter.
What I was suggesting was more or less a community grocery, but with pre-ordered items and those items we all need (toilet paper comes to mind). They could be combined with the needs of other members to acquire the quantities often required in order to obtain decent prices at Sam's, Costco, or central produce outlets. It would mean that not everyone would need to drive and endure the shopping marathon every week. We'd have to pay just slightly more in order to cover overhead, but not a lot, I suspect. Details, details...anyone think this might work? I'm just trying out one possibility to resolve one of the bigest issues we all share. I'll drop it like the proverbial sizzling spud if nobody is interested.

Actually that is a very interesting idea. The only problem is the same one all the grocers run into. All the land around with easy access is way over priced. How would you cover a chunk of land to build something like this for 1 million? Banks are pretty much shut down on lending so the only other option would be find a very rich investor willing to put money up on this.

Kevin, that's a great idea! I'm shocked,but you may have hit on something (quite by accident, of course).
If we could get the Salvation Army to put in a homeless shelter right downtown, then all the OTHER vagrants could move on in. I know you would feel more comfortable with your friends living closer, and maybe you would become, you know, less hostile. Your happiness is always uppermost in my mind, you know.

NOTE: The previous statement was not intended to reflect on the Salvation Army, or what it has been doing for so many years. They are often first on the scene at disasters and emergencies. They are working hard, often under extremely difficult conditions, to help people get off the streets. They improve lives. And their thrift shops are fun.

Kevin decorates his home with the furniture that the Salvation Army would reject...just like I do.