--- title: Your Grocery Store May Soon Be Cut in Half description: Many grocers known for the gigantic mega-supercenter shopping experience are trying out store models shrunk down to the size of the old neighborhood market. authors: - name: Brad Tuttle role: Senior Editor url: https://money.com/author/brad-tuttle/ bio: Brad Tuttle is a former senior editor at Money with over 10 years’ experience covering a vast number of personal finance topics, including careers, cars, travel, budgeting, investing, insurance, credit cards, consumer psychology, real estate, banking, and shopping and deals. education: Columbia University School of Journalism, MS at_money_since: 2014 articles: 366 covers: - Lifestyle - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Economy and Politics - Education - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Pets - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology social: - https://twitter.com/bradrtuttle - https://linkedin.com/in/brad-tuttle-834b225 former_staff: true published: '2014-06-02T22:28:05.000Z' modified: '2014-06-02T22:28:05.000Z' section: Lifestyle tags: - Aldi - big box stores - cities - Food - Fresh & Easy - groceries - Hy-Vee - Hy-Vee Mainstreet - kroger - Millennials - Publix - Retail - Smart Shopping - Supermarket - Trader Joe's - Turkey Hill Market - Wal-Mart - Walmart word_count: 556 canonical: https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![140529_EM_GroceryStore_1](https://img.money.com/2014/05/140529_em_grocerystore_11.jpg) *Bottled juice on supermarket shelves* For decades, the average American supermarket's size evolved similarly to the average American's weight: It grew and grew. Lately, though, many grocers known for gigantic mega-supercenters are trying out store models shrunk down to the size of the old neighborhood market. A few years back, the average size of a grocery store was measured at over [45,000 square feet, up from 35,000 square feet](http://business.time.com/2011/01/25/fewer-choices-more-savings-the-new-way-to-buy-groceries/) in the mid-'90s. The supersizing of supermarkets may have come to an end, however. The shrinking of grocery stores has been a noticeable trend in recent years. Chains such as Aldi and Trader Joe's, which both operate stores typically under 20,000 square feet—and which both happen to be [owned by the same German company](http://business.time.com/2013/07/29/how-two-german-owned-sister-supermarket-brands-became-hot-trendsetters-in-the-u-s/)—have been extremely successful, opening new locations left and right. Walmart, the ultimate big-box megachain, has stepped up efforts to expand its [small store formats](http://business.time.com/2014/02/24/walmarts-big-push-to-go-small-and-destroy-your-neighborhood-dollar-store/), especially in urban neighborhoods, to compete not only with local grocers but dollar stores as well. Plenty of other big names in groceries are also now jumping on the small-store trend. The [*Orlando Business Journal*](http://www.bizjournals.com/orlando/blog/2014/05/sources-publix-quietly-working-on-smaller.html) reported that Publix, which runs supermarkets as big as 60,000 square feet, mostly in the South, is working on a store prototype in the neighborhood of 20,000 square feet. [RetailWire](http://www.retailwire.com/discussion/17544/are-smaller-stores-a-big-opportunity-for-supermarkets) noted that several other large—and typically large-sized—supermarket brands, including Kroger and Hy-Vee, are also launching or expanding mini-grocery stores. Last fall, [Kroger opened three 7,500-foot-square-sized stores](http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/business/2013/11/29/more-in-store.html) operating under the name Turkey Hill Market in the Columbus, Ohio, area. The markets are a fraction of the size of the typical Kroger (67,000 square feet), and it's being presented as a cross between a convenience store and a supermarket. [Hy-Vee opened a 14,000-square-footer](http://siouxcityjournal.com/business/local/hy-vee-prepares-to-open-first-sioux-city-mainstreet-store/article_0515aa7a-d0da-55a8-8028-fb94e6956008.html) under the "Hy-Vee Mainstreet" concept in Iowa in mid-April. Obviously, with dramatically smaller stores, some compromises must be made. "In one of \[the larger\] stores, we may have 40 kinds of hamburger helper, \[in the smaller stores\] we have ten," [explained Tim Stupka](http://www.retailsolutionsonline.com/doc/as-hy-vee-embraces-smaller-formats-other-supermarkets-may-follow-0001), assistant vice president of operations for Hy-Vee's northern district. "Or, instead of having four different types and styles of bananas, we have two. We have pretty much everything those stores have, but we don't have as many varieties.” Such tweaks could hurt customer perceptions of their favorite grocer brands. One of the reasons that Publix, for instance, [scores highly among consumer ratings](http://pressroom.consumerreports.org/pressroom/2014/03/wegmans-trader-joes-publix-costco-sprouts-top-consumer-reports-supermarket-ratings.html) is that it's known for outstanding selection. But for a variety of reasons, big grocery companies think it's worth a shot to shift small. For one thing, whereas megastores typically require an undeveloped suburban location, smaller stores can fit almost anywhere, including densely populated cities, college towns, and even college campuses. Millennials, in particular, are more interested in living in such locations—and are more interested in quick-stop shopping, as opposed to the overwhelming, impersonal, time-consuming experience of roaming aisle after aisle of a ginormous megamart. Supermarket companies also like the idea of creating stores where the typical customer pops in several times a week, as opposed to the big-haul, once-a-week shopping visit. Hy-Vee has been opening [bars and restaurants inside grocery stores](http://business.time.com/2013/08/02/at-long-last-a-bar-at-the-supermarket-with-1-bottles-during-happy-hour/) with the idea that customers will visit more often, and linger longer. All that said, there's certainly no guarantee that a smaller store size will be a hit with consumers. The Fresh & Easy grocery chain was based on a neighborhood-quick-stop store size and it [wound up as an epic flop](http://business.time.com/2013/04/18/tale-of-two-supermarkets-why-fresh-easy-flopped-and-fairway-flies-high/). ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Lifestyle", "item": "https://money.com/lifestyle/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Health and Wellness", "item": "https://money.com/health-and-wellness/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Your Grocery Store May Soon Be Cut in Half" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/", "name": "Your Grocery Store May Soon Be Cut in Half", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2014-06-02T22:28:05.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2014-06-02T22:28:05.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "Your Grocery Store May Soon Be Cut in Half", "articleSection": "Lifestyle", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2014/05/140529_em_grocerystore_11.jpg", "width": 5364, "height": 3316, "caption": "140529_EM_GroceryStore_1" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Brad Tuttle", "url": "https://money.com/author/brad-tuttle/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/brad-tuttle/#author", "description": "Brad Tuttle is a former senior editor at Money with over 10 years’ experience covering a vast number of personal finance topics, including careers, cars, travel, budgeting, investing, insurance, credit cards, consumer psychology, real estate, banking, and shopping and deals.\r\n\r\n", "image": "https://img.money.com/2014/01/Brad-Tuttle.png?w=226&h=247&crop=1", "alumniOf": "Columbia University School of Journalism, MS", "sameAs": [ "https://twitter.com/bradrtuttle", "https://linkedin.com/in/brad-tuttle-834b225" ] } ], "publisher": "https://money.com/#organization", "datePublished": "2014-06-02T22:28:05.000Z", "description": "Many grocers known for the gigantic mega-supercenter shopping experience are trying out store models shrunk down to the size of the old neighborhood market. ", "abstract": "Many grocers known for the gigantic mega-supercenter shopping experience are trying out store models shrunk down to the size of the old neighborhood market. ", "@id": "https://money.com/why-your-grocery-store-may-soon-be-cut-in-half/", "inLanguage": "en-US", "dateModified": "2014-06-02T22:28:05.000Z", "wordCount": 556, "keywords": [ "Aldi", "big box stores", "cities", "Food", "Fresh & Easy", "groceries", "Hy-Vee", "Hy-Vee Mainstreet", "kroger", "Millennials", "Publix", "Retail", "Smart Shopping", "Supermarket", "Trader Joe's", "Turkey Hill Market", "Wal-Mart", "Walmart" ], "about": [ { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Lifestyle", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifestyle" ] }, { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Health", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health" ] } ] } ] } ```