...Idaho-based WinCo Foods. The grocery chain opens two locations today in South Fort Worth and McKinney (and three more in the next year). We grabbed a cart--somehow even the new ones have squeaky wheels--for a behind-the-scenes preview.
Yesterday, WinCo Foods VP Michael Read showed us the 95k SF store at Crowley Rd and Sycamore School Road in Fort Worth. Mike tells us the employee-owned discount grocery chain brings a unique bulk foods department that allows customers to buy only the amount they want of 750 items, including snacks, cereals, flours, pastas, spices, and even dog treats and birdseed. Last year, WinCo expanded its private label to almost 700 items. Michael says it plans to open about nine stores a year nationwide. Texas is the firm’s eighth state.
Venture Commercial’s Kevie Beard, Theo Thompson, Jonathan Cooper, DWC Commercial Properties’ Caroline Woodbury, and Venture’s McGregor Converse. Venture repped WinCo on the five DFW sites (and is assisting in their search for more). Caroline (DWC general counsel), along with DWC prez Don Woodbury, coordinated acquisition, development, and entitlement. Both McKinney and Fort Worth stores are about 95k SF, but future stores may be about 85k SF, Michael says. Theo tells us DWC asked Venture to find sites for a mystery grocer. (Better than a mystery meat at the grocer.) They had to identify locations based on a map that fit the customer profile. Each store needs about 10 to 12 acres.
Venture secured the two locations opening today (the other is at the southeast corner of N. Graves Street & U.S. Hwy 380 in McKinney) and three more opening before March 2015. The yet-to-be completed stores are at northeast quadrant of Rufe Snow Dr. and NE Loop 820 in North Richland Hills; the southeast corner of W. Main Street and N. Old Orchard Lane in Lewisville; and the northeast quadrant of U.S. Highway 67 and S. Cockrell Hill Road in Duncanville. Two are new construction, while the Lewisville location will be a lease of the 85k SF anchor building in Old Orchard Village East. (All have plenty of room for the 48 flavors of bulk coffee, including creme brulee and red velvet cake.)
