Garden City Park will have a large supermarket again in November, a year after Waldbaum’s shut its doors across Long Island.
Garden City Food, an independent supermarket opened by grocery entrepreneur Sonny Kil, is set to open Nov. 11 in the 42,000-square-foot space at 2475 Jericho Turnpike, one of more than 50 stores occupied by the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Co. before the company declared bankruptcy last year.
Kil has done a $1 million renovation on the store, which he leased in February after Waldbaum’s closed last November, he said. The store was one of 11 that A&P returned to landlords after declaring bankruptcy, according to records compiled by Newsday.
“There were a lot of vacancies and we found a good location in Garden City Park, so we took it,” said Kil, who owns seven other grocery stores, including Sweet Pea Produce in New Hyde Park.
Kil, a Jericho resident, said being an independent grocer gives him flexibility that corporate markets do not have.
For instance, Garden City Food will have fresh produce delivered daily, including a large selection from local farms in Long Island, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, Kil said.
“Unlike other supermarkets, we don’t get deliveries from the corporate headquarters,” Kil said. “We send out buyers to the locations and we buy our own products, and some items, we farm our own products.”
The Garden City Park store is the latest former A&P-owned supermarket on the North Shore to reopen under new ownership.
ShopRite, owned by the Wakefern Food Corp., opened in April in the former Pathmark store at 2335 New Hyde Park Road. In February, Best Market replaced Waldbaum’s at 40 Great Neck Road in Great Neck Plaza. A former Waldbaum’s at 1050 Willis Ave. in Albertson is now a Food Emporium store owned by Key Food Stores Co-operative.
Garden City Food will fill the hole Waldbaum’s left and likely boost business to adjacent stores in the strip mall it occupies, said Jerry Baldassaro, president of the Greater New Hyde Park Chamber of Commerce.
“There’s so many other stores that benefit from it, and that’s the key,” Baldassaro said. “When you have a destination draw, a supermarket like that, then people will go into the optical place or the jewelry store.”
Garden City Food is about half a mile from a King Kullen supermarket and about three-quarters of a mile from Sweet Pea and an HMart store on Hillside Avenue in New Hyde Park.
Kil said Garden City Food has received several job applications and gotten positive comments from visitors. He plans to hire about 65 employees, he said.
“It’s one more supermarket in their neighborhood,” he said. “It’s more options for the customers.”
