Things appear to be back on track for the Kroger at Embry Village. An updated siteplan was recently released on the property's website showing a 102,877 square foot Kroger as well as a new eighteen pump fuel center. The store, first announced in 2016, was expected to be 120,000 square feet along with the aforementioned fuel center and was to have opened in 2017.
The store has been delayed to the point that its timeline seemed indefinitely postponed or even cancelled. Had the store never opened, it would have been especially disappointing to patrons of the S&S Cafeteria, a local institution that was forced to close in 2016 after over 40 years in business.
ToNeTo Atlanta contacted Felix Turner, Kroger's Atlanta regional media contact, who Tuesday supplied us with the following statement with regard to the Embry Village store:
"We are scheduled to begin with the project by the end of January 2019." Turner further added "At this point the plan is for a Marketplace store. That is subject to change as the project progresses."
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| Original siteplan (click to enlarge) |
Turner indicated he was not yet able to confirm any other specifics of store - offerings, size, reason for delays, etc. - but promised to share those details as soon as they become available.
A January 2019 start to the project would suggest an opening in 2020 is feasible.
Strangely, real estate firm Kimco Realty, which owns and manages Embry Village, seems to contradict even their own updated siteplan with verbiage on their site.
"Embry Village is under redevelopment to expand Kroger to 120,000 square feet for a new Marketplace concept store. The complete site renovation will include 9,900 square feet of new shops next to Planet Fitness in 2020."
A Kroger representative previously stated that Marketplace stores are characterized by those that are 113,000+ square feet but new information suggests that Kroger stores as small as 100,000 square feet may still receive the Marketplace designation.
Two features the Embry Hills store is almost certain to feature are a Starbucks kiosk and Kroger Pickup (formerly ClickList).
Marketplace stores tend to offer a wider range of products such as clothing, small kitchen appliances and a Fred Meyer branded jewelry counter, among other offerings. Kroger operates a number of Marketplace stores in Georgia including those in Carrollton, Savannah, Gainesville, Dawsonville and Grovetown, all of which are larger than 113,000 square feet. The Kroger on Glenwood Avenue at Glenwood Place is 118,000 square feet and is referred to as a Marketplace store on the Kroger website, but does not feature the Marketplace banner at the store itself. The absence of a jewelry counter reportedly prevented it from "officially" being a Marketplace store.
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| Updated siteplan (click to enlarge) |
In recent years the company has also enlarged existing stores, as in Brookhaven and Decatur, where the stores were expanded to 81,718 and 109,773 square feet, respectively. The company has also built new stores such as the roughly 82,000 square foot store at Lindbergh Place and the planned store at West Midtown Center, a new project behind IKEA, that is also expected to be 82,000 square feet. The large format, but not Marketplace stores, have previously been referred to in Kroger materials as "Kroger Bountiful" stores.
Some stores however, like those in Fountain Oaks shopping center in Sandy Springs and Howell Mill Square in Atlanta, are currently undergoing extensive renovations but are not being enlarged.
In addition to the upcoming Kroger and 9,900 square foot building, Embry Village has in recent weeks welcomed a couple of new restaurants. Your Pie, an Athens-based quick serve pizza franchise, opened in the center, and more recently, Wayback Burgers, a Cheshire, Connecticut-based quick-serve burger joint, opened next to Moe's Southwest Grill along Chamblee Tucker Road.
Are you excited for the planned Kroger enhancements at Embry Village? What other shops or restaurants would you like to see open in Embry Village? Have you been to the new Your Pie or Wayback Burgers restaurants?
Please share your thoughts below