Tesco-owned supermarket chain Fresh & Easy has yet to launch 20 stores in northern California some 12 months after the company announced plans to open outlets in the Sacramento region during early 2009, according to a report in the Sacramento Bee.
There has been little visible progress at many of the sites, the newspaper reported, and the company has yet to pull a building permit for a proposed store on Sunrise Boulevard in Rancho Cordova. Another building, a former Tower Records and Books store, on Watt Avenue, is still empty.
A handful of sites – including a former Ralph’s on Bradshaw Road near Rancho Cordova and another location on Northgate Boulevard – show signs of remodeling or near completion, the newspaper reported.
Fresh & Easy continues to close deals for sites and is making its rent payments, real estate brokers and property managers said, but the company has not disclosed any opening dates.
Fresh & Easy spokesman Brendan Wonnacott told the newspaper the company is “absolutely committed” to opening the northern California stores.
“The main thing is to get the infrastructure in place,” he said, chiefly a regional distribution center. The chain’s existing stores in the Southwest are served by a 700,000ft2 warehouse and commissary in Riverside.
Fresh & Easy did not reveal the location of its northern California warehouse, but real estate brokers and grocery insiders have said since late 2007 that it would be in the Stockton area.
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