I love shopping at Wegmans supermarket. Well, I guess I should write that I loved shopping there. Wegmans does not have stores in the desert being solely Northeast/Mid-Atlantic in location.
Yesterday I went shopping there for the last time. How much do/did I love that place? For the last five years, the closest one to us has been about 18 miles away–one way–and yet it has been our main supermarket as well as our primary pharmacy. Before November of 2015, the closest one was about an hour’s drive–one way–and yet we still went shopping there on occasion.
Since 1998, Wegmans’ employees have put the company on the FORTUNE magazine’s list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For®. The list began in 1998. Wegmans has always ranked at or near the top among supermarkets in the American Customer Satisfaction Index® and has had at least one year as the top retailer in America regardless of sector. I miss 56PackardMan’s contributions to the blog, but especially miss him here as he spent much of his career in the grocery business. Anyway…the selection of items was fantastic (it should be in a 110,000 square foot store), the prices were very good and the service was amazing. When I asked an employee where an item was instead of being told “Aisle 8A” they would walk me over to the right location and make sure I found the item.
Before I finished loading the groceries in the Z06 (which was another reminder of our impending change as I almost always went shopping at Wegmans in our Kia Sportage, which we sold on Thursday), I took some photos of the exterior of the store.
Goodbye, Wegmans… 😦
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Thanks to all of the people who read this blog yesterday, which had the second highest number of views in a day in the history of Disaffected Musings as well as one of the top five in the number of unique visitors. Once again, people trying to find out why Cristy Lee is not on the Barrett-Jackson telecast were a large percentage of those views. I finally added a timely update to Where Is Cristy Lee? that answers why she is no longer a part of those broadcasts, at least my best guess. From showbizpost.com a picture of Cristy Lee that has been shown on this blog before.
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Events like selling the Kia Sportage and the last trip to Wegmans are making the move more real, but for part of me all of this is surreal and won’t believe we’re moving until we’ve actually done so. My mood has been more erratic than usual and it’s intrinsically erratic. My sleep has been even more disturbed than normal, which is both cause and effect for my mood. Unfortunately, I think the hardest part is yet to come.
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On this day in 1900 the first meeting of stockholders and directors of the Ohio Automobile Company was held. You know the company better by the name it adopted on October 13, 1902: the Packard Motor Car Company.
I haven’t written as much about Packard (and Studebaker, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, etc.) lately as I used to. Part of that is explained by the departure of 56PackardMan from the blogosphere, part by the shift in the search for a Grocery Car/Taxi/Corvette Companion to something more modern and not from a defunct American car company. I still admire the cars, though, and still wish some or all of the Independent car companies had survived along with makes like Pontiac and Mercury.
Given that Barrett-Jackson has resumed live auctions, here is a picture of one of my favorite Packards, a 1956 400 model, that was sold at their Scottsdale auction in 2010.
At the current Scottsdale auction, a 1955 Mercury Montclair convertible sold for a strong $75,900 all in. I am mentioning the car because it bears more than a passing resemblance to Packards of the same time frame. Let’s see if I can paste in a photo of that car:
I will continue to dream about owning a car like either of these two although I know it’s likely to remain a dream unfulfilled. Once again, what is life without dreams?
#GoodbyeWegmans
#CristyLee
#MovingStress
#Packard
#1956Packard400
#1955MercuryMontclair
#somanycarsjustonelife
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No we don’t have a Wegmans in Arizona. From your description the closest thing would be AJ’s Fine Foods. This is the niche upscale market owned by Bashas Foods from Chandler. Link here:
https://www.ajsfinefoods.com/
AJ’s would not be a full service grocery store so you will have to settle for Fry’s, the Western brand from the giant Krogers, Safeway/Albertson’s, or Basha’s full line stores, Bashas. We shop Safeway as it is the closest to us and we know and work with the staff quite well. I also prefer their meat and produce selections better than Fry’s. If there were a Bashas closer to us we would shop there as we like their line of products a little better than Safeway. Produce selections will be a little different here than there and Safeway generally has better produce than Fry’s. Just remember that your tastes will be different than yours as we have been ingrained with a taste for Mexican food and like our dishes spicier.
You have to understand that the grocery business is a specialized materials handling business. They have to move a lot of product to make a profit on a small profit margin. The background supply part of the storefront you shop at is huge with a vast warehouse and trucking infrastructure to keep the store shelves stocked. Also, since grocery store shelves are at a premium, you will never see a full line of a company’s products. In fact some suppliers pay a premium to the grocer just to get shelf space. The American food supply businesses are huge and complex and are unmatched in the world.
See you soon. Stay safe and know that this change is for the better. We will continue to do our part on this end. As always, let us know if you need us to do anything.
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Thanks, Philip. We are fans of Bashas and one of their stores will probably be our main grocery store and pharmacy. Their store on E Bell Rd in Scottsdale is very reminiscent of a Wegmans.
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There is a Basha’s near our house, about a 10-minute drive. However, for us, it’s a two-block walk to the neighborhood Fry’s, so most of our shopping is done there simply due to convenience.
We like Costco for bulk shopping of staples, but the nearest is in Avondale, a 20-minute drive.
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I am disappointed that you and I never ran into each other at Wegman’s. That particular location has been a faithful friend of ours since we traded the desert for the East.
Basha’s is probably your best bet. We had one 5 minutes from us in Tucson, and it was great. AJ’s is ok, but their prices serve as a clear reminder that they are catering to, and only want, a certain clientele. They have a lot of specialty items, but you’ll pay for them. And the non-specialty stuff is priced the same way.
I hope the move went well. I look forward to seeing how new environs produce new musings.
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Thanks, Josh. Once again, I will miss Wegmans, but Basha’s is a very good store.
Thanks for reading and for commenting.
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