The Independent Edition

Saleen Supermarket Owner: William Diaz Opened:  2007 Cooperative:  none Location:  1701 Wakeling St, Frankford, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  July 2021 I've mentioned in a previous post that Philadelphia has fewer, larger supermarkets than New York City which tends to have many small supermarkets. That leaves more neighborhoods of Philadelphia completely without a supermarket, including parts of Frankford. Corner grocers like this one, which appears to be around 1400 square feet, have to pick up the slack. This particular one looks like it was previously the Wakeling Supermarket, and later Torres Supermarket before becoming Saleen Supermarket in 2007. It wouldn't surprise me if, way back, this building was home to some chain grocery store, probably back in the 1930s or so. Regardless, until a few years ago, Frankford was served by a larger supermarket just to the north a few blocks from here. We're taking a look at that store tomorrow on Grocery Archaeology !

Mayfair Market by Hung Vuong Owner: Phat Mot Opened:  2019 Cooperative:  none Location:  6410-12 Frankford Ave, Mayfair, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  December 2021 Just about a quarter mile west of yesterday's ShopRite is the 30,000 square foot Mayfair Market by Hung Vuong. The Asian supermarket chain opened up shop here in 2019 following the closure of the Mayfair Shop n Bag in 2017. The Mayfair Shop n Bag was one of two that outlasted the Shop n Bag cooperative, but the other is actually still going strong as part of Allegiance Retail, the cooperative that supports Foodtown, Green Way, Pathmark, and others. Hung Vuong Food Market already had two locations in Philadelphia at the time this store opened, and a fourth opened in 2020. I'm not sure about how this store compares to the others, but it felt like they were making an attempt to add some basic American groceries here alongside the imported Asian products to fill some of the need left by Shop n Bag, but ...

No. 1 Asian Supermarket Owner: unknown Opened:  2018 Cooperative:  none Location:  2842 St Vincent St, Mayfair, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  July 2021 Not a great shot, but a picture nonetheless of the No. 1 Asian Supermarket just off of Roosevelt Blvd in Mayfair, Philadelphia. The 52,000 square foot building appears to be home to the supermarket and a food court. A while back, the space was home to National Wholesale Liquidators, then by 2012 the First Northeast International Market, which closed and was reopened by 2017 as the First Oriental Supermarket. And by late 2018, it had become the No. 1 Asian Supermarket. Out of curiosity, anybody know what this space was before National Wholesale Liquidators? (I remember going to their Linden, NJ location -- previously a Pathmark and later a Foodtown -- when I was little and loving their toy department.) These days, the No. 1 Asian Supermarket looks a little plain but large and nice inside. If you're interested in As...

Double Tree Market Owner: unknown Opened:  2016 Cooperative:  none Location:  3500 Cottman Ave, Mayfair, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  July 2021 Just up the street from yesterday's former Penn Fruit is this small grocer, which looks to be in the range of roughly 1600 square feet. It's really more of a convenience store or a bodega than a supermarket, but there are so many small independent grocers like this one throughout Philadelphia. The balance of Philadelphia is very different from the balance of grocery stores in New York City, which I'm more familiar with -- NY has many more supermarkets, but they're much smaller . Philadelphia has fewer, but much larger , supermarkets. Okay, those are extreme examples, but you get the point. I'm sure this spot has been a grocery store for many decades, but prior to Double Tree's opening in 2016, it was the Party Time Deli & Grocery. Tomorrow, we're headed up to Roosevelt Blvd (US-1) for our first of two stores...

The Richmond Shops IGA Owner: John Hallinan Jr Opened:  2016 as IGA, 1998-2016 as Thriftway Cooperative:  IGA Location:  2497 Aramingo Ave, Fishtown, Philadelphia, PA Photographed:  December 2021 Welcome to Fishtown! Or Port Richmond, or East Kensington, whichever neighborhood you choose to believe this supermarket is in. The 40,000 square foot store was built in the 80s with its strip mall as a Thriftway, which operated as the Port Richmond Thriftway until 2016 when the Thriftway/Shop n Bag cooperative went under. (Random side note, Allegiance/Foodtown now seems to have the rights to both names; we know they had the rights to SNB but they've recently added Thriftway to their "brand portfolio".) At that point, they joined Retail Marketing Group, a subgroup of IGA. Since the store previously operated as just Thriftway , it would make sense if they switched to just IGA. For whatever reason, they chose to instead rebrand to this odd combination of a website address an...