Dwight Vows To Find Shaw’s Successor

by zak stone | Mar 10, 2010 9:01 am

(16) Comments | Commenting has been closed | E-mail the Author

Posted to: Business/ Economic Development, Food, Dwight

Neighborhood leaders channeled fear and concern over losing the Whalley Avenue’s Shaw’s supermarket into the beginnings of a citizen-driven marketing drive to lure a new store to town. Supporters of the replacement grocery store will have to sharpen their sales pitches and rehearse their talking points, as they prepare to prove to the world why Dwight Place—the shopping center anchored by Shaw’s—would be a great place to open a new supermarket. This marketing campaign launched at a community meeting Tuesday night in the Dwight Police Substation. More than 50 potential volunteers gathered to hear about the latest development in the quest to replace Shaw’s. Linda Townsend-Maier (pictured above on left), executive director of the Greater Dwight Development Corporation (GDDC), said that New Haveners need to “make the statement loud and clear” that the city’s shoppers can support a new grocery store if they expect to attract a new corporate buyer. New Haven’s was one of only two stores statewide turned down by buyers like Stop & Shop when Shaw’s corporate parent SuperValu decided to pull the retail line out of Connecticut last month. As a result, the Whalley Avenue store will close at the end of March. That will put more than 100 workers out of a job and convert central neighborhoods like Dwight into “food deserts,” where affordable fresh food will be unavailable for those without a car. Click here to read a back story. Tuesday night’s was the second neighborhood meeting about the closing. Neighborhood leaders have been struggling with the difficulty of “harnessing the energy and talent [of the community] and moving forward,” said Whalley Avenue Special Services District head Sheila Masterson. Tuesday night’s meeting marked the first attempt on behalf of the GDDC to take advantage of community support as part of a concrete plan to advance the search for a replacement. The first step? Filling out a survey. All of the meetings attendants were presented with a questionnaire, which addressed questions like “Was it convenient for you to get to Shaw’s? Why did you not do more of your shopping at Shaw’s? What should a replacement supermarket do to be more attractive to customers?” The point of the survey is to give New Haven a “leg up” in attracting potential buyers, said Townsend-Maier. She said that corporations most likely “don’t consider the huge student and institutional population that’s in this town everyday” when they do their basic demographic research on the low-income Dwight neighborhood. Townsend-Maier insisted that there exists a market base to support a full service grocery store. The survey results will attest to the diversity of this client-base, the strength of their support, and the potential for revenue. Masterson agreed that the survey will dispel the notion that a discount grocery store is best suited for the neighborhood. She said that while a corporation might say that Dwight is a “poor neighborhood, we can sell our junk” with a discount supermarket, the survey will complicate this perception with information on use by “commuters and students.” Townsend-Maier said that analyzing the data will give the GDDC a unique picture of the community’s needs, before a third community meeting takes place March 30. She said that SuperValu has been less than helpful in providing the GDDC with financial statistics that would be useful for marketing the site to a new buyer. Community members suggested doing whatever it takes to get as many people as possible to fill out the survey. Doug Hausladen from the Livable Streets Campaign urged supporters to hand out the survey at the St. Patrick’s Day Parade and to “keep tweeting” links to it on the internet. Lee Cruz of the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven said that everyone at the meeting should prepare an “elevator pitch” and rehearse the “talking points” for convincing others in the community to fill out the survey and rally around a new store. Shaw’s employee Helen C. Powell asked if anyone could help educate Shaw’s workers about their financial prospects. She said that “some of the workers don’t understand” what is happening with their 401k or other aspects of the process. She carried with her a recent letter from her the United Food and Commercial Workers Union President Brian Petronella, which said that the union had proposed a severance package for the Shaw’s workers but had not received confirmation yet. Former Yale Alderwoman Rachel Plattus said that she will do her best to let Yale students know about getting involved, since many students are currently out of town for spring break. She asked how the community can help “fill the gap” during the “period of time when [Shaw’s] is not available.” Even if the GDDC finds a buyer soon, it is likely that there will be a period when the space sits idle. Townsend-Maier said that security will be a “major issue” at the plaza. She pledged to work with SuperValu to keep the lights on after the store closes. Masterson said that neighbors ought to pick up the phone and call their carless neighbors to offer rides to suburban grocery stores. If that happens, the community will not experience “that much of a desert,” she said. While there was some excitement among attendants about starting a farmers’ market in the store or even in the parking lot during the interim gap, Townsend-Maier said that the space is still controlled by SuperValu, which would probably disapprove of that idea. There are still “liability issues.” The parking lot is the “slip and fall Mecca of New Haven,” she said. Townsend-Maier said that the GDDC will meet with the mayor on Thursday to see what the city can do to help, such as offer incentive funds to a potential new buyer.

Share this story with others.

Post a Comment

Commenting has closed for this entry

Comments

posted by: THREEFIFTHS on March 10, 2010 9:53am I will say it over and over. The only way you will have a supermarket is if the Shaw’s workers and people in the community buy the store. Right now the community is being sold Snakeoil by the Greater Dwight Development Corporation ....Rember the

Greater Dwight Development Corporation owns this property and you mean to tell me that they did not know that this supermarket was closing.Are yiu telling me that a owner doesn’t know about what is happing with there property? Workers and community It can be done. When the world trade center was destroy There was a restaurant call Windows of the world.The workers used tere own money to buy a new place and started the restaurant back up.I notice one women talking about their 401k.That is a start,use some of that money.Also ask you minster’s as to why they can’t come together and buy this supermarket.Let’s be for real with this tax increase comming,It going to be very hard to find some one to come into new haven and buy any property

posted by: annie on March 10, 2010 9:57am It sounds like the survey is available to complete on line. If so please could you provide a link to it.

posted by: Jane on March 10, 2010 10:26am “The parking lot is the �slip and fall Mecca of New Haven,� This IS true. The same neighborhood that shopped at Shaw’s was also constantly suing Shaw’s, in a steady stream. And no, that isn’t how it is everywhere. In the urban areas of the state, slip and fall lawsuits are epidemic. There are lawyers in New Haven who eck out a living by pursuing dozens of these cases at a time. They are nickle and dime. The way they are resolved is in small nuisance settlements. The state’s attorney’s office is busy dealing with homicides. The insurance industry tries to keep a list of people suspected of bringing fake cases but that’s it. Connecticut Insurance Department only investigates worker’s comp fraud, not other insurance fraud. In states like Mass. that have initiated fraud bureaus that do include investigating these, they have saved millions of dollars for insurance companies/businesses and surely helped keep them from clogging the courts. I know a lot about this in New Haven because I was victimized by a woman here who it turned out has been involved in this activity with family members in New Haven almost continously, if not continuously, since the 80’s. She has several lawsuits pending right now as I write this, and yes, that’s even though the court has questioned her honesty in prior cases. That doesn’t matter—- usually has little affect on nuisance settlement amounts.

posted by: Jane on March 10, 2010 10:30am Oh, so, forgot to say that maybe part of the lesson here is we New Havener’s should stop suing our supermarkets unless something really did happen and we really did fall. It might help.

posted by: HewNaven?? on March 10, 2010 10:44am No one is buying the property, so stop talking about taxes. Greater Dwight owns the plaza. They are looking for a grocer to fill the space (i.e. a tenant). The survey will help market the spending power and diversity of the community and the greater New Haven area to potential grocers. Please participate. If you think workers or community members should rent the space themselves and stock the shelves as 3/5 said, put it on the survey. If you think it should be a Super WalMart as Alderman Greg Morehead suggested, write that down! The point is, participation is absolutely essential.

posted by: Michael on March 10, 2010 3:35pm There is a significant issues which neither the Dwight Community or the greater New Haven Community is addressing. It is an issues that might prevent another supermarket from opening in the Whally Avenue space. That issue is loss-prevention. Urban areas have a greater potential for higher instances of theft and other criminal activity. I suspect this is why not one other store bought out the Shaw’s space. It is(was) a busy market, and it does serve a diverse clientele. However, in this economic climate businesses are going to be less willing to risk smaller profit margins due to an avoidable expense, i.e. shrinkage/theft. Such a position might seem to be unfairly prejudicial but it is based on hard numbers and figures. This city is slowly decaying and it is no one’s fault but our own.

posted by: Doug Hausladen The Survey is now online:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/dwightsupermarket Additionally, please fill in comments on the SeeClickFix issue: http://www.seeclickfix.com/issues/25302 And for a paper copy of the survey to go door to door and collect responses from neighbors: http://www.tinyurl.com/newhavengrocer

posted by: Anstress Farwell on March 10, 2010 6:30pm Here’s the link to the survey: http://www.seeclickfix.com/issues/25302

posted by: New Haven Urbanism This is all wrong and those survey questions were horrifyingly misleading. Shaw’s did not care abotu Dwight. Stop & Shop would not care about Dwight. National chains don’t care about communities. The people who care at the residents. Those are the people who need to be providing the services and goods to the rest of the neighborhood.

I would love to have a small grocery on Whalley Ave, but I have no idea where to begin. I’m sure there are plenty of people in this neighborhood that have wanted to have a grocery store, or a bakery, or a book store, or a flower shop, but have no idea where to begin.

Step 1:

Find out who the people are that are interested in having a store that provides a service or a good for Whalley Ave’s adjacent neighborhoods.

Step 2: Determine what those stores are

Step 3: Pair or group people up that are interested in the same stores

Step 4: Go to the city and ask for them to provide some kind of tutoring or information sessions that educate people and help people understand how to operate and maintain a small business

Step 5: Establish something similar to the WASSD that connects new small business owners by encouraging group-reliance through building off each other with some type of general fund used to help businesses first start and make Whalley more attractive to inhabit

Step 6: Figure out a way to keep the network of cheap bulk food that is shipped to Shaws loading dock then deployed across Whalley’s newly established bakeries, groceries, book stores, cafes, banks, etc by having each business pick up their goods from the Shaws loading dock and bringing it back to their business.

This way, the same services and goods that Shaw’s supplied to the community continues to exist but it is now within walking distance of everyone’s house that lives in the adjacent neighborhoods to Whalley, and 100% of the revenue stays in the community and goes towards paying taxes for the business, but also towards the owners home who lives in the community, and the owner is likely to shop at other stores along Whalley. Trying to kiss a big chains butt to open up a store along Whalley is like asking to have you’re money shipping away to distant corporations to never be seen again.

Grand Ave as a good example, has a small affordable chain (CTown) and a supplemental network of local groceries that do quite well. We should look into perhaps trying to get CTown to come back to the Dixwell Plaza or open up somewhere on Whalley since without Shaws it would probably do great and then this could be supplemented by what I had outlined above. The worst thing we can do, however, is try to get a supermarket that serves the entire region in one gigantic box, this will just put us back into a vulnerable position again and set us up for another big hurt.

Also, even if one of the new small groceries closes, one two blocks down the street absorbs that clientele and perhaps can hire more people or expand the store or open a new store or all three. A dense network of many many small stores is much more difficult and takes much longer to fail that one giant box that is there one day and gone the next.

posted by: Pedro on March 11, 2010 9:37am Jonathan,you can’t just get the same trucks that are showing up at Shaw’s to continue to show up as much as we’d like to. The reason Shaw’s (and large grocers) can get those trucks, is because they are SHAW’S trucks. Shaw’s has a network of 35 distribution centers nationally that allows them to get the economies of scale to get those bulk goods. Shaw’s goes, those trucks go. All that being said, YES as to your Grand Avenue comparison. Grand avenue is definitely a model that Whalley should aspire to for the longer term. It has probably the biggest concentration of small and large grocery stores in the whole city. It is bounded by TWO large grocery stores, from C-Town to the East, to Ferraro’s at the west end. with small stores dotting the rest of the street between then. But all of this takes time and years to do. You can’t just expect it to flourish overnight, you can only try to set the environment (incentives, tax breaks etc.) for things like this to happen. I still think a large retailer for Whalley is not gloom and doom, and will be a benefit for the community, but in the long term it’s clear that relying on a single retailer is not wise.

posted by: New Haven Urbanism Pedro,

Thanks for responding.

I was more so trying to put the idea out there that we should look to see if there is a way to continue the importing of goods at a large scale that is then deployed locally. I do not know if there is an example of this, or if it is even possible, but I think it’s something we should talk about and try to find an answer to-it might be that we are the first to do it, or that it is completely impossible and other solutions are needed.

I understand that time is needed to build a network of local stores and between then and now times are gunna be tough-this is what our country set us up for when the old local networks were destroyed. But you and I both know that if we get another supermarket everybody is just gunna sit back and say “phew that was a close one”, when really all that’s been accomplished is delaying another huge failure of big box retail. That is what must be avoided. I do not know how to avoid this, but that is the conversation we must have-I can put my two cents in and I hope other people do to, so that we can get the best outcome for the community in the short run, but more importantly in the long run. Is there a reason why a connected network of local network of groceries, florists, butchers, delis, book stores, etc that is deployed over a distance in small shops can not also organize in a way that mimics a much larger single corporation that can control the importation of mass goods? Or is it just that this hasn’t been figured out yet, and Whalley Ave can be the first to do it.

posted by: Chuck on March 11, 2010 2:42pm Jonathan, Wanting to own a business and knowing how to do it are two critical pieces of the equation. The third, and arguably most important, is funding. If you don’t have the cash, you’re not setting up anything. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but banks aren’t writing very many checks to fund start-up mom & pop stores regardless if they are serving an urban community or not.

posted by: New Haven Urbanism Chuck,

1. Desire to start a business

2. Knowledge of how to operate a business

3. Group people together to pool resources and money Those 3 elements were outlined in my original post. Yes I realize tax breaks are made available for big box retail and suburban construction and not for urban infill, renovations and mom & pops in a way that encourages logical development. This is exactly what I’m talking about. The community needs to organize, go to the city, tell the city what it wants to do, see if the city can help and then doing what is best for the community. The city may be able to help fund in the beginning, or they may be able to get subsidies and tax breaks to the community and away from misguided development practices. This is what we need to talk about, not getting another wealth funneling blackhole supermarket that provides a much need service in an ultimately destructive way. Let’s figure out how to have the great service in a way that also benefits the community. Perhaps a food co op type thing can be set up in the shaws building, with the idea that the store will slowly expand to smaller locations through the Whalley corridor over the years. We just had a supermarket that screwed us all over, lets look at all the possibilities before trying to jump right back in the boat with another supermarket!

Perhaps we can get two smaller chains, one in the Walgreen’s shopping center and one in the Staple’s shopping center to anchor the corridor but are small enough that local groceries can still stay afloat and establish themselves in due time.

posted by: THREEFIFTHS on March 11, 2010 6:09pm Chuck on March 11, 2010 1:42pm Jonathan, Wanting to own a business and knowing how to do it are two critical pieces of the equation. The third, and arguably most important, is funding. If you don�t have the cash, you�re not setting up anything. I don�t know if you�ve noticed, but banks aren�t writing very many checks to fund start-up mom & pop stores regardless if they are serving an urban community or not.

Who said you need Banks.My in laws are from the Caribbean. My mother inlaw own’s fifteen rental property’s in new york. My mother-inlaw did not get the start-up money from the banks.She got the money from a �Sociedad which is a SUSU POOL. A Popular Way of Saving Money Among Immigrants

SUSU is a method of saving money through a money pool and is most commonly used among the West Indian, African, Mexican and Asian cultures across America. Mexicans refer to a SUSU as Tanda and Koreans call it Kaes. According to researchers, with immigrant communities growing, SUSUS are more popular than ever. Even now, this effective savings plan is an adopted trend among many Americans especially in New York City. I have participated in a SUSU on many occasions and was able to pay the first and last months rent and the security deposit for an apartment with just one SUSU payout. The rotating SUSU, is a practice immigrants bring with them from their country of origin and can be slightly different for each group. Some pools last longer than others. Some people play with higher dollar amounts. But common to every SUSU is a strong, collective trust among participants. They are neighbors, coworkers and sometimes even family. In such an arrangement, the social pressure on members to fulfill their commitments is very strong. A SUSU savings plan consists of a group of people who pool their money and distribute it among themselves periodically, one by one. For example, a dozen people might contribute $400 each into the pool every month for a year. In the first month, one person gets $4,800. The next month, the next person gets $4,800, and so on. At the end of the year, each person has contributed $4,800 and received $4,800. That is an example of a monthly SUSU, but can also be used as a weekly SUSU. For example, 20 people contribute $100 a week. Every week, $2000 is collected and one person takes home all the cash. The rotation ends 20 weeks later after everybody has had a payday. In Nigerian and Ghana it is called Susu account.

I will say it again.Comunity kick the Political Prostitutes and Judas Goat sellout

leaders out. Sit down with yourself and find a way to buy the store period!!!!

posted by: Anon on March 11, 2010 9:13pm if the employees find a way to buy the store, won’t they have to join some sort of larger cooperative? Regional?