New-Look Grocers Stores Try To Present Image Of Being A Good Neighbor While They Make Shopping Easier

From the parking lot, it’s already obvious that the new Yoke’s “Fresh Market” in Mead has something different to offer shoppers. Barn silos grace the signs and entrance.

Inside, the store at 14202 N. Market features a 1923 Model TT Ford truck, the tape-recorded sounds of seagulls in the seafood department, walls of bulk candy, a gourmet olive bar and other design and product features to attract shoppers in north Spokane County.

“What we were trying to create was something with a little West Coast flair,” said Denny York, Yoke’s senior vice president of store development and marketing.

Grocery chains across Spokane are embracing this new approach to supermarket design.

The elements can be as simple as the aisles named after Browne’s Addition streets in that neighborhood’s Rosauers store or as complex as paw print-decorated tiles and a revolving pet gallery at the new Spokane Valley Albertson’s on 32nd.

Designers of the Mead Yoke’s, which is located at the base of Green Bluff, paid particular attention to the area, A 40-foot mural in the produce department depicts a Green Bluff farm, circa 1946. Locally farmed fruits and vegetables are sold throughout the growing season.

“We wanted to give it a homey look, a little bit country,” said York. “If most people listed the things they wanted to do that day, grocery shopping is probably not one of them, so we want to make it fun.”

Attracting shoppers is the name of the game, he said, adding that no one supermarket chain has more than 20 percent of the local grocery business.

“You go into any new store here and the whole industry is knocking itself out to give the customer the best they can,” said York.

Carrie Houser, marketing manager for the local Albertson’s stores, said customers have reacted very favorably to the modern design features in the chain’s two new stores - on 32nd in the Valley and Regal on the South Hill.

In those stores, large overhead signs decorated with Coke bottles, pretzels and chips advertise “Beverage Boulevard” and “Snack Central.” Customers in the party and card department can look down to see confetti painted on the tiles and up to see bright ribbons.

“The decorative floor tiles direct you to a department, and the large, overhead graphics show you the way so you can find it easily,” said Houser.

Gone are the days when bigger was enough, she added. Instead of warehouses, customers want to be able to quickly locate the products they want, be entertained by interesting decorative features and have the convenience of other mini-stores within the supermarket.

Tidyman’s calls its store in the Latah Valley its “Northwest Fresh Marketplace.” All of the perishable products - produce, meat and seafood - are located on one side of the store.

“Customers have said they wanted that,” said Tidyman’s spokeswoman Patty Kilcup. “It’s more colorful, and it’s a fun store to shop because it feels like a marketplace.”

Around town

Kinko’s opens its new downtown location today across from the Spokane Convention Center at 259 W. Spokane Falls Blvd. To celebrate the opening, Kinko’s will provide $2,000 in document services and products to the Second Harvest Food Bank, the Vanessa Behan Crisis Nursery, Habitat for Humanity, Wishing Star Foundations, Spokanimal, Spokane Humane Society, Ogden Hall and the American Cancer Society.

The store will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Dave Hooke, owner of four Senor Froggy restaurants in Spokane, has been named host of the year by the Washington Restaurant Association’s Education Foundation. A past president of the association, Hooke has worked on education and regulatory issues for the restaurant industry.

Bed Bath & Beyond has opened a 37,000-square-foot store at Franklin Park Mall at 5628 N. Division. The store, the chain’s first in the area, carries linens, window treatments, cookware and storage items. Bed Bath & Beyond operates about 300 stores nationwide.