Klein’s ShopRite at Festival celebrated its grand reopening today after expansion; features “Café Express” eat-in area and gourmet food section
The Klein’s ShopRite at Festival at Bel Air celebrated the opening of its remodeled store today. The grocery expanded into two adjoining properties and now features an Artisan Bread Station, a Cheese Creation Station, an expanded Delicatessen and “Café Express” eat-in area. Here are the details:
KLEIN’S SHOPRITE AT FESTIVAL RE-OPENS AFTER EXPANSION
Enlarged Store Features All New Departments, Offerings, Layout
Bel Air, Maryland: Welcoming shoppers into the newly-remodeled Klein’s ShopRite store in the Festival at Bel Air shopping center on Route 24 in Harford County, Marshall Klein, Director of Operations for the Harford-County based family-owned stores, says “This work required a great deal of patience from all of our Associates and managers — and most importantly, from our customers! But we have a wonderful, visionary new store ready now for everyone, and we hope everybody will be pleased and as excited about it as we are,” he adds.
Klein, who managed the entire reconstruction process, doesn’t underestimate the scope of the remodeling. “It was a huge undertaking,” he states. “We knocked through into two old stores next to us, and had to completely demolish everything to bring those spaces, which totalled 10,000 new square feet, into our systems, while at the same time totally redesigning the layout of our entire space. For instance, our back rooms underwent demolition and the construction of new areas; our produce preparation room and cooler were completely removed and rebuilt, from scratch, in new locations – same as our bakery cooler/freezer and our deli coolers!”
Keeping the store open during the process, which took the better part of a year, was also arduous. “Many of our departments had to shift, share space, relocate, work with smaller areas or temporary areas, and even find ways to do things they’d never had to do before,” says Human Resources Coordinator Michelle Norton. “But it was worth it – the new store is phenomenal!” she adds.
The completely remodeled and expanded ShopRite now features a “Scratched-Baked” Artisan Bread Station; a Cheese Creation Station where fresh cheese is cut from a giant wheel; an expanded Delicatessan and “Café Express” eat-in area; a special section devoted to gourmet creations; an Asian Hot Food Station with in-store sushi preparation; expanded Natural Food offerings; expanded Ethnic & Specialty Foods; a 40% larger produce section; a “doughnuts fried daily” section; and a large “Meals-to-Go” array.
According to Marshall Klein, more is coming. “Our first self-checkout machines are about to come on-line,” says Klein, “and soon, ‘ShopRite from Home’ will start up – that’s where you can go online and shop, and your groceries will be loaded into your car for you, when you drive up to the store!”
The Grand Re-Opening of the store officially occurred on Sunday, June 12, with a reception celebrating the event held on Wednesday, June 15. Sales on many items in honor of the newly remodeled store are offered at all seven Klein’s ShopRite stores from June 12 through July 9.
For more information, visit http://www.shoprite.com/.
I actually have to give a kudos to Klein’s/Shop Rite/Wakefern for proactively remodeling & expanding the store offerings ahead of Wegman’s. Few stores that compete against Wegman’s do this. Most actually just shut down (see Weis in Abingdon or Shopper’s in Lutherville). The Earl remains amazed how grocery stores can’t copy some parts of the Wegman’s model. Give Klein’s credit here. They have always presented a clean shopping experience with generally competitive pricing. They’re locally owned so that helps. That being said, Wegman’s is going to cause a paradigm shift in how Harford County shops. Their prices for the basics consistently even beat Wal*Mart. Change is coming in September that may very well lead to additional vacant grocery storefronts…Giant-Abingdon – GONE? Lord Have Mercy on the competition. Klein’s is far enough away to have an advantage for those that don’t want to deal with the coming traffic nightmare.