Dive Brief:
- Amazon confirmed the opening of eight new Amazon Fresh stores on both the East and West coasts over the past two and a half weeks.
- The company signed several of these locations’ leases years prior but is only now utilizing the spaces, according to local news reports about the locations.
- Amazon will continue to selectively open Amazon Fresh stores “as we see results we like,” company spokesperson Griffin Buch said in an emailed statement.
Dive Insight:
After surpassing the 50-store mark in September, Amazon Fresh’s footprint now consists of 60 stores after the company recently opened three in California, two in New York and one each in Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, the company confirmed.
Amazon Fresh's expansion continues
The locations range from 31,000 to 59,000 square feet. Buch noted that Amazon is “encouraged by early signs” coming from stores that follow the refreshed design it debuted in Chicago and Southern California late last year.
Amazon Fresh paused store expansion early last year and has recently resumed openings. The newly opened New York locations, one in Plainview and the other in East Setauket, were each originally leased about two years ago, local news outlet Long Island Business News reported in early October.
A Philadelphia-based news outlet reported that Amazon signed the lease for the Willow Grove, Pennsylvania, store that opened Thursday in 2020 but delayed the opening due to the banner’s pause.
A number of these stores also mark Amazon Fresh’s debut in new markets, according to local news reports. The East Setauket location is the grocer’s debut in Long Island’s Suffolk County and the Willow Grove location is the first Amazon Fresh in Montgomery County. The Twin Peaks Plaza shopping center store is the first Amazon Fresh location in California’s San Diego County.
Amazon recently added a Tennessee distribution center to its list of Amazon Fresh locations on its website. While Amazon did not confirm when this fulfillment center opened, the company said the location at 410 Harding Industrial Drive in Nashville supports grocery delivery and pickup and also has a dedicated retail space where customers can shop a limited assortment of grocery and household products in person.
While local Virginia news outlet Annadale Today reported an Amazon Fresh would open at Bailey’s Crossroads shopping center by the end of this year, Amazon did not confirm this or share additional details about the location.
Amazon declined to share any store growth targets for the expansion of Amazon Fresh but noted it would continue to test locations in various markets and base its next steps on customer response.
Catherine Douglas Moran contributed reporting.
