To Market, to Market in Manhattan
Graphic designer Lydia Mann strapped on an empty backpack and trekked a mile and a half with a friend through the bitter cold in mid-January because of a tantalizing newspaper ad announcing, of all things, that a new grocery store had opened in Manhattan.
But when Mann, 42, arrived, she was “heartbroken” to find out that the Whole Foods Market -- part of the new $1.7-billion Time Warner headquarters overlooking Central Park -- wasn’t quite ready to open its doors.
When it did last week, 20,000 people flocked to the store the first day, Thursday, and it was still packed on Saturday.
Most of the advance attention given to the 80-story twin-towered complex centered on the expensive restaurants, multimillion-dollar condominiums and chic shops that are starting to occupy the sleek atrium mall, which will also house studios for Time Warner-owned CNN.
On Wednesday, 5,000 of the city’s business and social elite were invited to an advance sampling of the center’s restaurant fare -- they nibbled on yellowtail and truffle rolls from sushi chef Masa Takayama, caviar and gold-leaf “beggar’s purses” at Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s Rare and truffle-dusted popcorn at Per Se, the New York outpost of Napa Valley chef Thomas Keller.
But for regular New Yorkers like Mann, it was the prospect of the Whole Foods supermarket that had them salivating. Sure, the city has other places, some cheaper, to buy salmon, strawberries, fresh-roasted coffee, brie, chicken cutlets and takeout sushi, not to mention obscure Portuguese cheese, handcrafted marshmallows and Asian pears.
But to New Yorkers accustomed to grocery shopping as a “Survivor”-style endurance competition, the new supermarket, Manhattan’s largest, has loomed as a 59,000-square-foot suburban-style wonderland, with the promise of 41 cashiers, relatively wide aisles, and an in-store wine shop -- a New York City rarity because of the way alcohol retailing laws are written. There’s also a 248-seat cafe where shoppers can eat purchases from the 500-item prepared-foods selection.
For residents of other big cities, such amenities might seem routine. But in Manhattan, where space is at a premium, many existing options for large-scale shopping are crowded and difficult to navigate, said Loretta Glazer, 75, a retired talent manager who had come Saturday to Whole Foods to enjoy a pastry. “By the time you get to the checkout, you’re exhausted,” she said.
Survival strategies vary: Some big families with cars travel to New Jersey suburbs on weekends to shop more easily; others take advantage of rental cars to stock up at a large Harlem outpost of Fairway Foods, which is known for its good prices but gets gridlocked during peak hours. A new online service, Fresh Direct, has won converts, but it has a $40 minimum per order. Many just resort to day-by-day purchases at corner grocery shops.
Saturday afternoon, two workers blocked the escalator entrance to the new Whole Foods, leaving a long line of disappointed would-be shoppers to gaze longingly at the profusion of white lilies, yellow forsythia and purple heather for sale inside. Four times already, the crowd inside had grown so large that no one else could enter for 10 minutes at a time, and delivery had been suspended because of the crush. The opening was a “community event,” said Joyce Ivanovitch, 68, one of the lucky ones to make it in.
Judging from those leaving, half were buying, half were just browsing or had given up because of the crowds.
Tracey Moore, 33, a singer-songwriter, had originally been headed to Whole Foods’ much smaller outpost downtown, “where you’re constantly bumping into people and everybody’s got an attitude,” she said. As she filled her basket with produce in the new store, she said, “I love it.”
Another Whole Foods of the same super size as the new one, but on three levels, is under construction in Manhattan’s Union Square, said David Lannon, president of the company’s Northeast Region. It’s scheduled to open in late fall or early winter.
Maybe by then the novelty will have worn off.
Rebecca and Brad Handler, who described themselves as “real foodies,” had their children Liza, 3, and Dashiel, 13 weeks, in tow Saturday as they checked out the oven-ready entrees at the store in the Time Warner Center. Brad Handler, 37, had already come the day before, for lunch. Although the store’s size was appealing, the crowds were daunting, said Rebecca Handler, 38. “I’ll have to see when it calms down,” she said.
