Ralphs to Open This Week
Long-Awaited Supermarket to Debut, As Company Talks of a Second Downtown Location
by Evan George
Seven years after announcing the company's return to Downtown Los Angeles, the new Ralphs in South Park is set to open its aisles on Friday, June 20. The store is Downtown's first new mainstream supermarket in more than half a century.
Dave Hirz, president of Ralphs, at a self check-out counter in the Downtown store. The South Park establishment is a Downtown homecoming; the first Ralphs opened in 1873 at Sixth and Spring streets. Photo by Gary Leonard.
Delays and construction woes have long plagued the project at Ninth and Flower streets. With a supermarket strike threatened for Southern California, some have wondered if the store's grand opening would be further postponed.
Store brass say this time the opening is official, and even said another Ralphs could land in Downtown. A tour of the South Park premises late last week showed the 50,500-square-foot store quickly filling with food and hurried workers.
"All of our new stores throw parties for the team members, so we will have breakfast for the employees on Friday," said Dave Hirz, president of L.A.-based Ralphs. "After that the doors will open."
Around noon, store officials plan to hold a ribbon cutting ceremony where they will present donations totaling $737,500 to local charities, schools and community programs. Hirz called it a homecoming for the company; the first Ralphs opened in 1873 at Sixth and Spring streets.
Like the recent red carpet groundbreaking for the Convention Center Hotel at L.A. Live, the event promises to draw a cadre of city officials and local leaders, as well as many eager Downtown residents.
"This is by far the most exciting store we've opened," Hirz said.
The Downtown establishment will be one of only 25 "Fresh Fare" Ralphs (the company operates 263 supermarkets in Southern California). The upscale concept caters to top income households with luxury items and specialty products, Hirz said, placing Downtown in ritzy company with Malibu, Westwood and Beverly Hills.
The Wait
To Downtown boosters and 10,000 new residents, the high-profile project became much more than a store years ago. First broached in 2000, with a deal inked in April 2003, the market has been hailed as a turning point in Downtown's renaissance.
"Unlike opening up in Sherman Oaks or some other suburban location, it is a categorical expression of the fact that Downtown is back with a vengeance," said Carol Schatz, president and CEO of business advocacy group the Central City Association. "It means that we are a vibrant, vital community with a critical mass of residents or they wouldn't be here."
The Ralphs sits below the new Market Lofts, which holds 267 condominiums and five other chain retailers. The $247 million mixed-use project, called South Village, by developers the Lee Group and CIM Group, also falls in a prominent redevelopment area.
As expectations grew, the store came to symbolize the residential rebirth of Downtown. When the project lagged with delays - it was originally set to open by spring 2004 - it represented the building snafus and skyrocketing construction costs that plagued many other area developments.
In February 2005, when it was on the brink of defaulting on its city development agreement to build on the seven-acre plot, CIM reworked the project and brought the Lee Group on board. Three months later, crews began preparing the site.
In January, officials and company executives celebrated the beginning of interior construction with an announcement that the store would open in June. That date came and went.
Now with an end in sight, Hirz downplays the slow pace. "This has not been any worse than most stores. What has been different is the nature of the constraints," he said.
In fact, the company is already thinking of the future. Hirz said last week that Ralphs is looking at designs for a new location at First and Grand, where the Grand Avenue project is expected to break ground later this year. He would not provide any other details.
Sushi, Laundry, Wine
Despite the store's symbolism, for many residents and Downtown workers, their interest in the Ralphs is practical.
Kelly Kim, who has waited for the store to open since she moved into the nearby Met Lofts, said she takes a taxi to Koreatown for groceries because she doesn't have a car.
When told the store is opening, the fashion design student exclaimed, "That's so cool!"
Cruising past the still-shuttered store on her bike last week, Coco Conn craned her neck to check for signs of progress.
"The only reason I leave Downtown is to go shopping," said Conn, who lives at Ninth Street and Broadway and works for a Downtown-based web company. She said she still plans to patronize Japanese markets for some groceries, but will gladly cut supermarket runs to surrounding areas. "Everything was a big schlep," she said.
Inside, employees scrambled to stock the gaping shelves with non-perishables and packaged foods. Out of 180 workers, about half are new hires from the area, Hirz said. While construction workers tinkered with finishing touches, he unfurled a blueprint of the intricate floor plan, bearing the telling date of December 2002.
"Laying out the stores is a lot of fun," he said, pointing to where the temperature-controlled wine cellar has been installed and where the gourmet carving station will be. He showed off the chowder station, cheese and olive bar and an impossibly long row of fine wines and liquor, already with prices and discounts affixed.
Shoppers who drive can park below the store, where 126 spaces are reserved for Ralphs patrons.
The company also plans to unveil features unique to the Downtown location, Hirz said, because they believe it will be a different demographic than they normally serve. There will be a wine tasting station and, eventually, a pick-up program where Downtown residents and workers can place an advance order for everything on their shopping list.
"We anticipate the needs of our customers may be different," Hirz said, noting that the company expects high traffic but low average sales - meaning fewer families.
Like some other Fresh Fare locations, the store will boast laundry service, a cafe area and an island counter with a sushi chef slicing fresh rolls to order.
When asked about sales volume, Hirz said he expects the store initially to bring in about half as much as the highest performing Ralphs, which generally have revenue of about $1 million a week. That's based on seven years of exhaustively studying the Downtown area, he noted.
In the long run though, he said the company has high expectations for having a new top store.
Prev
Linear Mode
