This morning, District officials were on hand as the ribbon was cut at the District's first ALDI grocery store, located at 901 17th Street NE. more ›

Sure, it might have been rodent-infested, but the old Safeway on Rhode Island Avenue NE was still the grocery of choice for many Brookland residents before it closed in March 2010. And even though a Yes! Organic Market on 12th Street NE is a fine option for some, the residential neighborhood could certainly support a supermarket. How about Harris Teeter? more ›

This week, some of the world's biggest retailers are meeting in Las Vegas for the International Council of Shopping Centers' annual meeting. Mayor Vince Gray and Councilmembers Harry Thomas Jr., Vincent Orange and Michael Brown, though, are putting several chips on one specific dot: Wegmans. more ›

The redevelopment of the Cleveland Park/McLean Gardens/Wisconsin Avenue Giant -- which has been in the works now for well over a decade -- has been at the heart of one of the city's longest-running and deepest-cutting neighborhood spats. more ›

Now here's an interesting story from the Post -- a group of residents in Temple Hills, Md. have started a campaign to inject some vibrancy into their business scene, and, as part of that effort, they'd like to open up a weekend farmers' market in the parking lot of the Naylor Road Metro station. Good idea, right? Well, Metro isn't too thrilled about it. more ›

Yesterday, when we wrote about the Waterfront Safeway instituting a receipt-check policy, many commenters argued that the policy was something that would be good for the store, which has apparently been struggling to stop shoplifters. But Jenny Rogers reports today that Safeway spokesperson Craig Muckle said the policy "could be rolled out at all District Safeway stores by the end of the year." more ›

UPDATE: Well, that was fast -- a couple of DCist tipsters let us know that a gauntlet of greeters at the store's main exit are indeed checking receipts today -- and that refusing search is going to be tougher than simply walking away. One Safeway customer tells us that "calmly refusing doesn't appear to be an option," given greeters' "body language" and "them nearly blocking [the] exit." However, based on our tipsters, receipt checkers were apparently only stationed at the main exit and not the secondary one leading to the parking garage. more ›

H Street NE will officially get its Giant. The grocery chain and developer Steuart have finally agreed to a deal to feature a 41,200-square-foot Giant as the anchor for the gigantic 286,500-square-foot 360˚ H Street mixed-use development at 3rd and H Streets NE. The deal between Giant and Steuart had been pending since April. (For what it's worth, Michael Neibauer notes that Giant was Steuart's fourth choice for the space, after efforts to lure Harris Teeter, Yes! Organic Market and Trader Joe's didn't pan out.) The development will also feature other street-level retail and 215 housing units; construction is expected to begin in the spring and the Giant is slated to open in 2013. more ›

We Love DC reports that the planned Harris Teeter supermarket inside Constitution Square -- a 2.5 million-square-foot mixed-use development near Union Station which broke ground in 2008 -- is scheduled to open on December 7. The 50,000-square foot Teeter will surely be a boon for those who live in the area around Near Northeast and along H Street NE. That area of town, once really suffering from a lack of decent grocery options, will have not only the new Harris Teeter, but also a new Aldi, which is planning on opening up a store at 901 17th Street NE sometime in 2011. more ›

A hot-button issue in the District of Columbia is the ability of all its residents to have access to groceries. Cleveland Park certainly doesn't have that problem -- but it is a neighborhood that is the home to one of the most vitriolic fights over grocery stores in the city, a battle that is twelve years strong and shows no signs of going away anytime soon. more ›

We received a tip this morning that the Secret Safeway at located at 1800 20th Street NW -- also known as the "Town House" Safeway -- will be closing its doors on August 7. We can now confirm that the store will indeed be shutting its doors on that date, after a manager at the store affirmed the date. The store, tucked away and with minimal signage, was an experiment by the Safeway chain in the 70s to branch into smaller groceries which would appeal to urban apartment dwellers. Of course, there's no shortage of Safeways in the area: the closest one is just down the street at 1701 Corcoran Street NW. But from all accounts, the Secret Safeway, though seemingly pricier than regular Safeways, was a serviceable option for neighborhood residents -- we're sure that there's at least a few of you that will be sorry to see it go. more ›

D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty is set to announce Friday that a Yes! Organic Market will become the retail anchor for a new mixed-use development at 2323 Pennsylvania Ave. SE, marking the first all-organic grocer to open east of the Anacostia River. more ›

Safeway Inc. decided to fully embrace the nickname D.C. residents long ago bestowed to its Georgetown store on Wednesday night. The grocery chain threw an elegant, exclusive party to celebrate the reopening of the newly reconstructed "Social Safeway" on Wisconsin Ave. more ›

In the run-up to the start of the District's 5-cent disposable bag fee, city leaders put out the word to area grocery stores and other retailers and organizations that they needed donations of free reusable bags. D.C.'s poorest residents would need help getting their hands on bags that they can reuse, which often cost $1 or more to purchase. more ›

Looks like a deal is nearly in place for a Giant Food to go in to the empty lot at the corner of 3rd and H Street NE, according to a Washington Business Journal report. An agreement is said to be pending between the grocer and Chevy Chase-based developer Steuart Investment Co. Steuart was recently the recipient of a $5 million tax abatement from the D.C. Council to help speed up development of the parcel. more ›

As excellent neighborhood chronicler Southwest ... The Little Quadrant That Could reminds us, the Southwest Waterfront Safeway is set to close tonight at 6 p.m. until April 15, when it will reopen in a brand new building adjacent to the old one (1100 4th St. SW). The interim period will find Southwest residents without a nearby grocery option (unless you count the 7-11 on South Capitol Street), but Safeway has arranged for a shuttle to take shoppers to the 14th & Kentucky SE location on Friday, Saturday and Monday (schedule is here). more ›

The Safeway located at 1855 Wisconsin Ave. NW, more commonly known as the "Social Safeway," at last has a reopening date: May 6 will be the big day, as the Washington Business Journal reports. more ›

Last night's collective raid on area grocery and hardware stores left shelves bare and patience worn thin. We've heard about hellishly long check-out lines, like at the Foggy Bottom Trader Joe's, where the line actually looped twice through the entire store and out the door. We've heard about people losing their sense of perspective. We've heard about gridlocked parking lots. But it doesn't really sink in just how bad of a pre-storm freak out Washingtonians has last night until you look at the photographic evidence. more ›

We heard through the DCist tipline that the P Street Whole Foods in Logan Circle was planning to close an hour early tonight. Given that this is the eve of what is looking like the biggest snow storm Washington has seen in a long time, this merited a phone call. And a customer service rep confirmed that, indeed, the Whole Foods is closing at 9:30 p.m., instead of its usual 10:30, due to an ill-timed staff meeting. You'd think the store's manager might want to reschedule this meeting until next week, under the circumstances. more ›

The Safeway on Rhode Island Ave. NE reopened late Thursday, after a follow-up health department inspection deemed the store in compliance and all issues related to its vermin infestation corrected. The store had been temporarily shuttered on Wednesday evening after a routine inspection discovered evidence of rodents. more ›

View Safeway closed due to vermin in a larger map more ›

Gotta concur with DCmud's sarcasm in reporting this piece of news concerning an expected ribbon cutting next year for a new Whole Foods at the Shops at Wisconsin Place development, located at the Chevy Chase/Friendship Heights nexus.

While the Bethesda-Chevy Chase corridor may seem like a scripted stage setting for the Whole Foods phenomenon, Chevy Chasers have until now had to drive all the way down to Tenley for their organic Gruyere, or eke by (gasp) on Giant or TJ's foodstuffs.

We missed this one from the Washington Business Journal earlier this week: Harris Teeter is looking at a fourth location in the District, this time at the mixed-use Capitol Riverfront development The Yards, nearby Nationals Park. The lease has yet to be signed and the BizJo estimates it would take at least three years before the store could open thanks to the current financing market, but word of a grocery store coming to the area understandably elicits breathless comments from neighborhood officials. '“We're thrilled there's going to be a Harris Teeter in the neighborhood,” said Michael Stevens, director of the Capitol Riverfront Business Improvement District ... “They all bought into the vision of the neighborhood and a grocery store is part of that vision,” he said.' more ›

Residents of LeDroit Park and Shaw could have a new grocery store option soon, according to a report from the Washington Business Journal's Jonathan O'Connell. Philadelphia-based The Fresh Grocer is reportedly looking at moving into the large Howard Town Center project, a mixed-use development in the works next to the Howard University campus. The development is planned to replace the area surrounding and including the Bond Bread Building in the 2100 block of Georgia Ave. NW, and will include more than 300 residential units, over 70,000 s.f. of commercial property, and parking, according to DCMud. more ›

There's a few things happening in the world of organic grocery stores lately, with some good news for Petworth folks and not-so-good news for Columbia Heights residents. First the good: the Yes! Organic Market at 4100 Georgia Avenue NW officially opens today at 3 p.m. Wednesday at 10 a.m. As for the bad, over the past few weeks some passersby have reported construction work being done in the space that Ellwood Thompson's organic supermarket is renting in the DCUSA complex at 14th and Irving. You'll recall that back in April the Richmond-based grocer announced the opening of their first D.C. store was delayed indefinitely due to the economy. Of the recent visible work inside the space, Ellwood Thompson spokesperson Cyndi Watkins had this to say: "As of right now I have not heard anything new about us moving to D.C. Any construction being done must be work the landlord is doing." UPDATE: Looks like Ward 4 Council member Muriel Bowser's office jumped the gun on announcing the Petworth opening. A spokesperson for Yes! Organic Market now tells us that the store will be opening for the first time at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, August 19, with the ceremonial ribbon cutting pushed back to Thursday, August 27. Both Bowser and Mayor Adrian Fenty are expected to be in attendance on August 27. more ›

Metro formally announced today that SmarTrip users can add value to their cards at select CVS and Giant Food stores. Last year, WMATA made SmarTrip cards more widely available for sale at CVS and Giant, but now customers can also choose to add money to their cards at both chains while they check out. more ›

Resident Jeff Davis shared the news with the Cleveland Park listserve this morning that the years-long battle to allow Giant Food to remodel its store at Wisconsin & Newark appears to have finally come to an end. The project dates as far back at 1998, though it was revived in its current form in 2006 before being derailed once again by NIMBY concerns over traffic and parking. You'll recall that more recently, the Cleveland Park Citizens Association experienced a coup/meltdown in the wake of the impending Giant plan approval. more ›

Just a little straight up feel good PR from grocer Giant Food. The company sent out word today that it donated the $100,000 commission it received from the D.C. Lottery as a result of selling that winning $144 million Powerball jackpot ticket to the Capital Area Food Bank. The winning ticket came from the relatively new Giant on Alabama Avenue in Southeast. The Food Bank plans to use the money to support the renovation and construction of a new, bigger food distribution center. more ›

The Cleveland Park location of D.C.-area based Margruder's Market is closing its doors this weekend, according to Nbcwashington.com. Saturday will reportedly be the last day of business for the market, located at 3527 Connecticut Avenue NW, at the intersection of Connecticut Avenue and Porter Street NW. It's a bummer for the adjacent neighborhood, as Magruder's was a convenient spot to be able to pick up essentials. Magruder's locations in Gaithersburg, Rockville, Kemp Mill, Vienna, Falls Church, Alexandria and Chevy Chase will remain open. The rising cost of rent is cited as the reason for the closing. more ›