What is your favorite Supermarket?

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Mostly shop at Pathmark and Stop n Shop as they are close by. But I prefer A & P - they have a few nice ones around where I live and their prices are pretty much in line with everyone else. A & P meats are the best!

Doug
 
I have lots of options for grocery shopping.

 

Cub is where I go routinely.  They have competitive prices, a very good selection of produce and a wide variety of natural/organic foods.  They have self-service checkout lanes which I find very convenient for smaller shopping trips.

 

Rainbow (owned by Roundy's) is also good price-wise but their selection is limited on the things I use.  I don't like the way their stores are organized.  In the time it takes me to find 5 or 6 items there I can fill a shopping cart and be headed to checkout at Cub.  I once went to Rainbow to get baking powder and, not only couldn't I find it, but THREE employees I asked couldn't find it either!

 

Super Target gets a good share of my business, partly for the one-stop shopping convenience and occasionally for some very good sale prices.

 

For 15 years I lived a half block from Widmer's, a small family-owned store.   I loved their wonderful old-style meat department in the back.  I will still make a trip back there on occasion for some of their homemade sausage or when I'm planning a barbeque get-together.

 

Mississippi Market Coop is expensive but the quality is hard to beat and there are members-only specials which make it very reasonable on occasion.

 

Whole Foods is the most expensive place in town and too trendy for my tastes.  I would rather shop at the Coop or Farmer's Market and support local business.

 

Byerly's stores have been the "destination" shopping experience for decades, with in-store restaurants, on staff culinary experts, fabulous deli and bakery departments and prices to impress the snootiest Edina housewife.  

 

Lund's stores are related to Byerly's but scaled-back on the frills.

 

Kowalski's is another high-end chain of stores.  They are too expensive for regular shopping but they excel in other things.  The one on Grand Avenue is run with the precision of a Swiss watch.  The employees bend over backwards to be helpful and the front-end managers are experts at crowd control.  On the busiest days of the year (think night before Thanksgiving) when the store is mobbed with shoppers I could pick up a few things and be back in my car in 10 minutes.  They have a very good meat department and the beef carrying shopping baskets is often quite good-looking too.

 

Aldi doesn't have much of what I'm typically looking for and the nearest Walmart with a full grocery department is too far away to be an economical option.

 

 
 
ShopRite

does it for me!  We were both born the same year.  I'll hit Kings if I need something unusual or high-end.  Although there's Stop & Shops around here, I don't know anyone personally who's ever been to one.  PathMark, mega-ugh.  "Open 24 Hours"=never thoroughly cleaned.
 
@ Doug....................

Doug, I agree with you 110%, I always thought, and still think that A&P has the best meat.
MIKE
 
How did I forget this?

Schiff's on N. Main Ave. in Scranton, PA.  My sister and I make several pilgrimages a year for their stuff.  The BEST cuts of meat, and things you don't find anywhere else like porketta/porchetta.  Excellent deli, most prepared in-house.  Fresh kielbasi (sometimes hard to find in Jersey unless it's Easter).  They are also a restaurant supply place, so you can buy frozen chicken kiev, stuffed shrimp, etc. the same place as the diners do.  Giant-sized Campbell's soup and other groceries.  A-Treat soda.  AND Krispy Kreme fresh daily.  Next door is the beverage distributor, we used to hit that for Crystal Club soda (featured on "The Office") until the company went out of business.
 
Well for grocery chains it is strictly Shop N Save for me which is a Pittsburgh based company, they give gas perks at Sunoco, while not as much as Giant Eagle their prices are noticeably lower. I dont go to Giant Eagle as they are too pricey and there are alot of snooty coustomers there, I refuse to go to Wal-Mart or Sve-A-Lot as they are both dirty and all the trash shops there.

 

For my freezer meats(beef, pork, chicken, kielbassi, bacon) I go strictly to Mikes Packing and get my freshly slaughtered meat packed in the quanities I want and neatly wrapped in white paper, and their prices are far better than the supermarket, I get ground round at 70/30 ground meat prices.

 

For my milk in glass bottles as well as any deli items I want I go to Kauffmans Family Deli which is a Mennonite owned store with the most wonderful baked goods and deli meats and cheeses.

 

For my frozen convenience foods and bulk canned goods I ht the Restaurant Depot on the Strip District of Pittsburgh, its a members only joint and I have a card from the fire departments  Ladies Auxillary. For example I get 10 lbs of chicken strips for $18.99 so the price savings are great I just have to have an empty car and about $500 to spend as I buy a car load when I go and stock up.

 

In the summer when I want fresh produce and it isnt something I grow in my garden or I need a large quantity of it(like cabbage to make sauerkraut) I take a drive to Janoskis farm stand in Clinton, Pa and only on tuesdays and with grandma so I can get the 15% senior citizen discount on my produce order
 
Wegmans is my all time favorite store. Worked for them for 5 years after I was downsized in 2006. Now here in Florida we go to Publix. I work for them PT. It's a nice store great service, just not all the high end stuff i am use to getting in Wegmans. Everyone I met down here that is from the Northeast wishes Wegmans would expand down here. I am one light away from Publix and two lights away from Winn Dixie and Aldi. I have seen in the paper ads for Albertsons but have not found where it is yet. There is a Whole Foods but to organic for me.
 
WalMart Supercenter, but I only go in there about once or twice a year right now.  I shop at HEB about 99.99% of the time.  We're getting a new HEB Plus in the area in time for thanksgiving shopping.  It will be the largest HEB in the area between here and Ft. Hood.  I'm looking forward to that cuz it will have an expanded area, but I odn't think I"ve ever bought anything at the deli counter, or anything special, just too expensive for me.  But it will be nice to have increased variety and possibly some gourmet variety to opt. if I so choose.  We have a Target that's a "shrunken" version of a regular Target.  Sometimes if they have an item or two on sale generally I "cannot live without", I'll go and then paruse through the grocery items area and get things that are a bit unusual.  I like many of their Archer Farms products because they'ree a bit upscale and different.  If I need or want beef or similar meats in large, high-quality quantity, I will go to Sam's Club.  And as David & Allen have stated, prices between HEB & WalMart are competitive withg HeB winning out more times than not. 
 
Here in Mass I shop at Stop and Shop most of the time and with a good sale. Then its Price Rite in Revere and SuperWalmart in Salem NH. My partner works for Shaws/Star Market and the prices are a tad much there. We are getting a Wegmans in Northborough MA that I am looking forward to opening in October 2011.
I also shop at H Mart in Burlington and they have Korean detergent that I do like quite alot plus the produce there is quite good. They have anything and everything for Asian cooking.
When I lived in Chicago I loved going to Dominick's and once in awhile Jewel.One place that I did hit alot there was Caputo's in Bloomingdale IL at the end of the Elgin /O'Hare Expressway. And another place was Yohans in Arlington Heights now called Mitsu or something like that. When I lived in Omaha I was a SuperTarget shopper. HyVee was good as well. Very rarely I would ever shop at Bakers. Now Bag-N-Save I would get the mac salad that was to die for with the chunks of cheese in it. I make that now from scratch here.
 
Raley's owns a number of chains.  Around here, all of the Nob Hill supermarkets sold out to Raley's probably ten years ago, but they're still called Nob Hill.  Lately I'm finding they're more expensive than Safeway on items I usually buy.  I really hate Safeway but no matter which direction I head from home, Safeway is the first market I'll encounter so it's a convenience thing.  Their staff is both annoying and apathetic at the same time; very Stepford and creepy.  As in, "Did you find everything OK?"  If you didn't, they couldn't care less so why do they even bother to ask?  Because management tells them they have to.

 

Save Mart is my favorite supermarket.  They have an excellent selection and prices are reasonable.  Unfortunately, they're not conveniently located.

 

When Albertsons bailed out of Northern California, Save Mart bought most of their stores and resurrected the Lucky supermarket chain.  Unfortunately, Lucky markets are the exact opposite of Save Mart, with limited selection and a general lowest common denominator target demographic.  I don't go to Lucky at all.

 

Fresh and Easy has just opened here in a former Albertsons.  I haven't checked them out, but plan to.  They'll be opening more stores in the coming months.

 

Local independent chains are still hanging on.  Lunardi's is high end.  I used to shop there for my mom when they had a good ad for a given week, but I don't go there myself anymore unless I want something special from the butcher.  Too expensive on non-sale items to make it worth bothering.  Another local chain that had been around since the 40's, PW Markets, just folded a few months ago.  The rest of the local chains are ethnic supermarkets catering to either Mexican or Asian clientele.

 

Target has expanded their grocery section and they have every-day prices that are on par with other supermarket sale prices.  I do select grocery shopping there, but they aren't a grocery destination for me.

 

Dave's son-in-law is in management at Whole Foods, but we never shop there.  They don't call it "Whole Paycheck" for nothing.

 

 
 
Whole Foods

If you're ever in Austin, Texas, it is worth a trip to the headquarters of Whole Foods, which has a flagship store. It is sort of like the Disneyland of grocery stores.

The parking garage is below the store, and they have an escalator for your shopping cart. I'd never seen one of those before!

In addition to indoor seating, there are two outdoor terraces where you can enjoy a coffee or eat prepared food purchased inside, with free wi-fi throughout. One of the terraces has a man-made babbling brook.
 
I have lived an hour away from that store for 25 years and have never been there.  when I as at UT in 1973-1977, it was viewed as quite a quirky little store. 
 
I Shop at Several Stores for Different Things

I usually go and get my canned goods and the non-perishables over at Save A Lot....they have the best prices on the things I use the most. I also get cold cuts and the like there too.

 

I don't like their meats, but Safeway usually has good specials, if you're willing to be flexible about menus. I also like some of their Bright Green cleaning and paper products. Good prices and they work well. Safeway is also my "go to" store in a pinch, since I have one about two blocks from work.

 

I also hit Fred Meyer for the canned and packaged stuff if I can't make it to Save A Lot...their prices are much better than most others. I also like their deli fried chicken better there...it's the closest to homemade without me dragging out the cast iron skillet. I have an Albertson's on the way home, but unless they are running a super special on something, I don't stop. 99% of the time, I end up getting annoyed shopping there.

 

Back when Chris and I were still a we, I did a lot more shopping at Costco and Wal-Mart Supercenter, but I don't usually purchase a large enough quantity of anything to make that much of a difference in the bill for me.
 
<span style="font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;">I spread it around.</span>

 

<span style="font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Most of my food purchases are from Costco, albeit usually in bulk form. </span>

 

<span style="font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;">For other stuff, like produce that Costco doesn't offer (radishes and green onions, for example) or specials on frozen entrees (perfect for work lunches), I'll go to Pak 'N Save, which is owned by Safeway and generally carries much of the same stuff as Safeway. I prefer Pak 'N Save to Safeway because the local store is larger, with more room on navigate a cart in the aisles, with better lighting and usually with a better selection. Also the nearest local Safeway is in a crowded strip mall with bad parking and too many pan handlers and vagrants. </span>

 

<span style="font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;">For stir-fry and kim chee ingredients I'll generally visit one of the many local Asian markets. Haven't made kim chee for a while and am starting to want it again, so I guess I'll be picking up a load of Napa cabbage, daikon radish, ginger, etc at the local market fairly soon. </span>
 

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