The Grocery Store Market in Northwest Arkansas

[Julles]

Yeah it sounds pretty interesting. I'm pretty familiar with the company supplying their specialty foods.

[Mith242]

Pinnacle Station opened a few days ago. I stopped in there last night with my boys to check it out and to grab a bite. It is defininitely an interesting mix. I doubt there are many places where you can dine on breast of duck with baby carrots, a side of Cheetos, a Jolly rancher slush, and your choice of dark chocolate truffle cake ($4 a slice) or Krispy Kreme doughnut. The salad bar is extensive, and the Pizza Rustica is very impressive as displayed. They offer 8 or 10 varieties of pizza, including Margherita and Ceasar Salad, and the slices are huge (avg $4.25/slice). The boys and I split 2 slices and had a little left over. Toppings are huge chunks of meat and veggies. We decided it looked better than it tasted, but in fairness, we were there at 8 pm as food service was winding down; the pizza had likely been sitting for a while. The fresh meat and seafood looked good, as did all the bakery items. They also have 8 or 10 flavors of gelato, samples of which are freely offered. I can see why; when you taste it, you want it. My sons liked the fountain drink bar the best; all sorts of frozen drinks are available, including frozen Mt. Dew, Dr. Pepper, etc, and there are several flavor add-in options for fountain drinks. Specialty coffee drinks were available as well, if I remember correctly. There is a nice seating area for dine-in, but also plently of paper goods and packaging items available for packing up whatever you need to go. Gas was at $3.75, a surprisingly reasonable price for right now. I didn't really check out the upscale grocery aisles, but will take a look next time.

I could easily see my girlfriends and I having lunch there. I hope it lasts.

[Mith242]

Looks like Ozark Natural Foods has bought the building it's been occupying at Evelyn Hills for the last 8 years. ONF has been using the ground level of the old Montgomery Ward. They apparently are now going to focus on the lower level and start using it as office and storage space. I believe there's a small store next to ONF that's also in that building. No idea if ONF might eventually take over that spot as well.

[Mr. Knowitall]

Okay I'll put this in the subforum because I'm not sure if there will be enough interest in the general Arkansas forum. I'm trying not to overwhelm anyone who are trying to focus more on developments and such. But anyway Arkansas Business is reporting that Wal-mart increased it's lead in the grocery market in Arkansas. In second was Kroger and third was Harp's. Kroger and harp's are pretty close in the number of stores. Especially since I don't think the report takes into account the new ones they've bought or opened recently. But Krogers still does doulbe the amount that Harp's does with around the same number of stores. Probably because a lot of Harp's stores are located in small rural towns as well as the northwest Arkansas metro. I'm wondering if Harp's has what it takes to eventually get to second in the state. They're mainly based in northwest Arkansas, although they do have some stores down toward Hot Springs and Russellville. But they've made no moves to get into the Little Rock market or southern Arkansas for that matter. Kroger obviously has more resources and could more easily spread out. Although I think what would really make them more of a force in the state is if they moved into the northwest Arkansas market.

[Mr. Knowitall]

The cool thing about Ozark Natural Foods is that it is a co-op, which means it is owned by the community. And the quality of their products is awesome; they buy a whole bunch of local produce in the summer--and no food scares for tomatoes, chiles and ground beef.