Friday, July 20, 2007
Grocery Obsession
With all the talk of grocery stores coming, or not coming to H Street and the surrounding area I thought I would share this impressive site called Groceteria on the history of grocery stores (see the switch from small shops to the large format stores that we know today) that I found while browsing Richard's links. If you prefer to look at old photos of shopping malls you should go here instead.
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16 comments:
I would not at all be opposed to tax abatement for small businesses that keep their property maintained.
In fact I think we could start to fund it if we raise the vacant property tax from 5% to 10%. That would sure help H street.
A few community members, Anwar Saleem (HSMS), Anne Phelps (ANC 6C04 Comm.) and I (as the affected ANC Comm.) have formed small group to "lobby" Trader Joe's to locate at 3rd & H Street NE.
Our effort is similar to the group that brought Whole Foods to 14th & P Street NW (it doesn't look like Whole Foods is interested in the 3rd & H site). We will be presenting income, demographic and other market data to help convince them it makes good business sense to locate at the site.
In addition, we are gathering signatures on a petition and compiling individual emails expressing the reasons why people support having a Trader Joe's in the neighborhood.
If you are interested in helping this effort, please send me separate emails with the following:
1. A personal message to TJ's on why you want them in the neighborhood.
2. If you would like to help circulate the petition, the block or blocks you are willing to cover.
Please send the emails to:
alan@alankimber.org
Best,
Alan Kimber
ANC Commissioner, 6C05
"Let's work together to make our neighborhood the best it can be!"
When I lived in Shaw back when U Street and P Street were duking it out to try and get Whole Foods, the critical element that swung them to P Street was the video the Logan Circle Neighborhood Association put together. It showed Whole Foods what their potential customer base would look like: well-dressed, affluent, and ready to spend money. I think it was that personal touch that swayed them.
Harris Teeter. 1st and M, NW.
Wait for it.
With all due respect to anonymous, I'd rather not "wait for it."
Though Harris Teeter will be welcome when it arrives, it won't be significantly closer to me than the Starburst Safeway. And it will have the added disincentive of being located on the opposite side of the railroad tracks...making walking that much more difficult.
I'd just as soon work to bring a smaller niche grocery store to H Street in addition to the Harris Teeter at 1st and M.
Just walk over on M Street. Takes you under the tracks past the metro station. But I do agree. I still hope for Trader Joe's.
Starburst Safeway
Laughs! Call that place what it is, the Benning Rd. Safeway.
Hill Rat-
Don't know how long you've lived in town, but I believe that the Starburst Safeway follows in the grand tradition of giving every Safeway a nickname- with the first word usually starting with an 'S'. For example- 'Soviet Safeway' in Adams Morgan, Secret Safeway in Dupont, 'Social Safeway' in Georgetown-what used to be 'Unsafe Safeway' at Kentucky and D SE.
When I first moved to this side if the Hill, we used to call the Benning Rd Safeway 'Suicide Safeway'-but perhaps that's not the best way to get people to shop down there.
I guess it's no longer fair to call it the Suck-Ass Safeway, since they've recently remodelled. When I moved here the store was filthy, the meats were suspiciously green or gray, and most of the staff (with the exception of the checkout ladies) were amazingly surly. And they did absolutely nothing to stop the panhandling and actual muggings in their parking lot.
The old Safeways on the Hill sortof summed up what it meant to be a consumer on the Hill at the time - we were treated as a captive audience that would put up with anything and beg for more.
I'm really hoping those days are behind us.
even with the remodelling, i was witness the other week to a group of about four kids that whizzed by me as i was entering the store.
you could tell they were carrying items underneath their shirts.
the cops followed, but sadly, stopped outside the front doors and got on their walkie talkie things to call some more 'fit' officers.
i hung around, and needless to say, the cops showed up about ten minutes later, long after the little thieves were out of any clear and present danger.
Poo Poo:
I'd like to congratulate you on several weeks of good posting. No crazy diatribes, no personal insults.
Granted, it's not as much fun to post this way.....
Harris Teeter, Trader Joes, M st, 3rd St, Pennsyvania Ave. I doesn,t matter to me. The Starburst Safeway needs some competition. I don't know about the quality of meats or produce, because I rarely do any serious grocery shopping there. I stopped shopping there years ago. When I do shop there for small purchases, the express lines stretch back to the middle of the store. And I am guaranteed a 30 minute wait, just to buy some juice and asandwich from the deli.
I currently shop at the Giant near the Silver Spring metro. I rarely have to wait more than ten minutes at checkout. They also have a fair amount of self checkouts. Needless to say, the quality of food is excellent. And the they also have good organics food selection. If there is extra money in the budget, I will stop in at the nearby Whole Foods. The wait there is uasully about five minutes.
I've been living on the Hill since '97, so I'm well aware of the habit of nicknaming Safeways. My own personal name for the Benning Rd. Safeway was G.A.S. (Ghetto Ass Safeway). Hillman's description of that place before it was remodeled is 100% accurate. The place used to be so dirty that I wouldn't buy canned goods or toilet paper there.
What I'm really mocking is that someone has swallowed the realtor driven rebranding of the Benning Rd./Hechinger Plaza as "Starburst." I don't know anyone that's lived in DC for more than six months that calls that area anything other than 'around the way'.
I remember when welfare mothers would stop you and ask if you wanted to buy their food stamps. This was when the Hechinger Mall Safeway was supposed to be nice.
thank u, hillman!
although...
i did go on a rant on one of my posts yesterday.
i had been talking about blogs and their potential with some folks, and sort of took it out on this forum.
oh well. i think one rant a week is fair, no? :op
cuz... it's kinda boring without some zaniness.
Granted I'm relatively new to the hill earlier this spring(prior Chinatown), but I have never even thought about shopping at any of the current grocery stores on H St. Let's face it they're ghetto and I may seem a bit trite, but as a resident of Capitol Hill I expect more than that. I've never been in the G.A.S Safeway, but I have to assume that it's not much different than Murphy's on H St. and similar to the Giant on P & 8th St. NW (where the Chinatown residents were forced to go). I feel we all live in one of the more famous areas on the planet and we shouldn't put up with the "sub-standard", pan-handling, shoplifting, parking lot muggings, etc...
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