CHESAPEAKE
Shoppers anxious for the opening of a new Kroger Marketplace in the Grassfield area of southern Chesapeake will have to wait.
Indefinitely.
Scheduled to open in 2019, plans for the location at Dominion Commons East are on hold, the city said.
“At the time they had an ambitious plan for construction,” said Jay Tate, Chesapeake’s director of development and permits. “We’ve been told that corporate is evaluating all expansion plans throughout the country.”
Tate said the rumor mill has been running hard since no obvious construction other than land clearing has taken place.
“We’ve heard the soil was bad or that it was wetlands,” he said. “Not true. They have an approved site plan so they can start whenever they want.”
In late 2016, word got out about the new store planned by Kroger. At the time, a Pilot story said it was slated to open in 2019 and would feature a grocery, pharmacy, growler bar, jewelry department and an outdoor fueling center.
“It’s the almost identical floor plan to the one on South Battlefield,” Tommy Drew, vice president retail brokerage and sales for S.L. Nusbaum Realty Co., told Inside Business at the time. That location opened in August 2016.
“There will be a café, wine with sommelier, buffet, cheese and olive bar,” Drew said.
The field where the Kroger was to be built has been cleared and leveled, but there are no signs of construction. The silence prompted two readers to submit questions to Glad You Asked, a new Pilot initiative seeking story ideas. Readers voted for one of three questions online, and the Kroger question won.
One of the readers, Shonda Davis, was disappointed to hear the news.
“I do most of my grocery shopping at Harris Teeter,” she said. “But I like Kroger for the growler bar. They have 12 taps and it’s always a lot of fun.
“I’d been seeing all the rumors on the Next Door app, but I was still hoping. It’s closer to my house than the other growler bar.”
Kroger corporate affairs manager Allison McGee echoed Tate’s statement, stressing that the company would share more information as decisions are made.
Kroger owns 16.8 acres of a 55-acre parcel surrounded by Shillelagh and Cedar roads, and Grassfield and Cahoon Parkways.
The area already is grocery store-rich. Within a mile there is a Walmart Supercenter, Farm Fresh, Food Lion and Aldi, and the city has approved plans for a Lidl nearby. Farm Fresh announced the sale of most of its stores last week, but the future of that location is unknown.
Tate said Kroger plans to hold onto the land so it can start construction when it’s ready.
The area has seen expansion recently, with the opening of a second 7-Eleven, a Chick-Fil-A and a small strip shopping center.
“A new tire store and a car wash have been approved,” Tate said. “Naturally, we’d like to see everybody’s development prosper, but Kroger is on hold.”
Got a question? Put a Pilot reporter on it.
https://modules.wearehearken.com/virginian-pilot/embed/756.js
Got a question? Put a Pilot reporter on it.
Hampton Roads has plenty of curiosities. Ever think of a question you wish someone would answer?
If so, we want to hear from you through Glad You Asked. Readers send questions through an online form, and our newsroom picks three at a time for an online vote. The winner becomes a story.
So what makes you wonder? We’re listening.
Lee Tolliver, 757-222-5844, lee.tolliver@pilotonline.com
