A Fresh & Easy store planned in Fountain Valley will be the third to open following a three-month hiatus of grand openings by the Tesco-owned grocery chain.
A market in Manhattan Beach will be the first Fresh & Easy to debut. That store, Tesco’s 62nd in the United States, will open July 2 followed by another one in North Las Vegas. On *July 16 17, the Fountain Valley (Warner & Bushard) store will debut, making it the seventh British convenience market to open in Orange County.
Fresh & Easy did not provide any more details on future store openings.
In the meantime, Fresh & Easy chief executive Tim Mason told the Financial Times this week that the British chain could expand its neighborhood grocery concept to the Midwest.
Mason said expansion outside its core California, Nevada and Arizona territories would likely be supervised by Jeff Adams . The Tesco executive was recently transferred from Thailand to help Fresh & Easy’s struggling operations in the United States. Here’s what what the Financial Times had to say:
“A bullish Mr Mason dropped heavy hints that Mr Adams, the former Tesco chief in Thailand, would be deployed to another part of the US - most likely to be in the Chicago and the Midwest - once the 61-strong chain reaches critical mass in California, Nevada and Arizona.”
Adams will join Bryan Pugh in beefing up Tesco’s U.S. venture. Both Adams and Pugh share the same Fresh & Easy title: executive vice president of operations.
Adams’ arrival comes as Fresh & Easy works to tweak the look and product assortment of its first 61 stores, including six in Orange County.
The grocery chain suspended new store openings nearly three months ago so it could “smooth out wrinkles” in the concept, which some shoppers have described as plain and boring. Over the last several weeks, Fresh & Easy has made good on a promise to add more ready-to-heat meals and European-inspired deli items. These so called “meal solutions” have proven to be among the most popular items at Fresh & Easy, which entered the U.S. promising busy shoppers fresh foods and takeout meals in an easy to navigate store.
On the new side: I’ve spotted everything from whole-cooked chickens to an expanded assortment of ready-to-grill meats to more fresh juices. (For a detailed list of new store offerings and prices, CLICK HERE.)
To date, Fresh & Easy has opened local stores in Orange, Huntington Beach, Laguna Hills, Anaheim, Buena Park and La Habra. More are planned in Orange (a second one), Fountain Valley, Fullerton and Westminster. (SEE MAP)
*opening date updated to reflect change by Fresy & Easy (11 a.m. June 18)
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- Japan’s Famima convenience store opening soon in O.C.
- Fresh & Easy to add 250 new food items
- Tesco to revamp Fresh & Easy stores, add British foods
- Vons to Fresh & Easy: we’re not copying you
- Fresh & Easy off to rocky start. A look at the first 100 days
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Good luck to Fresh & Easy with new stores and new chickens, etc.. More competition in the segment where Trader Joes, Mothers and a couple more like Sprouts live will mean better prices for all us suffering consumers. However the one time I shopped at a F&E (don’t live near one and gas is dear!) I found the prices a bit high, much higher on ready to eat meals than Sprouts and more expensive than TJs on grocery shelf items like trail mix, cereals, olives, etc. By far the greatest, cheapest, best cooked chickens in the universe are sold at Costco. I think they still charge $5.49 (recently up from $4.99) for a big, juicy Foster Farm rotisserie chicken. Ralphs charges around $10 for a skinny, dry one! I wonder what F&E will charge for cooked chicken?
I am a fan of Fresh & Easy, but I do find items spoil a lot faster then the exact same items I can find at Trader Joes, this is really disappointing. A bag of lettuce or collard greens should not go bad within two days (and trust me it will from Fresh and Easy). I will look at the dates on all the bags and they will all be the same. Makes me wonder how fresh it really is. I can buy produce at Whole Foods and it usually lasts over a week.
But I do have to say I love the meat selection and the cheaper peppermint & sparkling waters! Its well worth a try if you live by one or happen to pass by one.
I’m still not a fan of having t deal with self-serve check outs. If the trouble of doing this myself were reflected in the prices, I’d reconsider. But they’re not.
I’m looking forward to the re-launch and to see what they did with the re-thinking of their stores. When I lived in Britain I shopped at Tesco a lot — especially for their ready-made meals, which were always tasty and convenient. After work, pick up a chicken curry and a salad and a bottle of wine and you’re good to go! But when I checked out Fresh & Easy a couple of times here in OC, I was disappointed — the store seemed like a ghost town, with hardly any customers, and staff members wafting around like lost spirits. The selection of food wasn’t great, especially in the ready-made meals section. And I HATED the self-serve checkout — it always seems like such a service cop-out. A couple of stores seem like they’re trying to force us into self-serve checkouts — I was in Albertston’s last week and they had a poor young staff member — obviously seeing the future and her check-out job being phased out! — accosting people in the check-out lines and very emphatically urging us toward the do-it-yourself line. I refused to go — I actually prefer to stand in line rather than waste my time trying to figure out each store’s different self-checkout mechanism (which rarely works anyway, and I’m left with some electronic voice bugging me to “move items away from the checkout area” or “scan next item now”!). I noted that SHE noted this refusal down in a notebook. Maybe stores are re-evaluating the do-it-yourself checkout thing. It is to be hoped. Good luck to Fresh & Easy - I’ll be giving it another try or two, but I’d really love to see the variety of convenience meals they offer to customers in Britain!
Regarding the self-checkout. I initially had very strong negative feelings regarding self-checkout. It didn’t help that I had horrific experiences with it at Albertson’s and Ralph’s (I still won’t go near self-checkout at a large grocery store). Anyone who thinks it is the same at Fresh and Easy needs to try it. The self checkout at Fresh and Easy is so efficient (and almost fun!), you will be surprised. Not only that, I have never checked out without help. Someone is always there to bag my groceries. I have grown very accustomed to fast checkout, so much so that I became very frustrated with the slow lines and lack of checkers at Albertson’s yesterday.
My husband and I love Fresh and Easy! We love the fact we are not running into 10 people in one isle like Trader Joes and I like the fact that I can check myself out. I don’t know why people have such a hard time with the self-checkout. We also love their tomato/basil and mozzarella sandwich and the mango lemonade (it goes well with vodka). I usually buy things that have been marked down because of the expiration date and those are the times that I get more for my money. I can get a salad bag for less than a dollar. I would have to agree the food doesn’t last long in the frig, but all I can think of is that it must not have those preservatives.
You people need to wake up already!! Tesco (fresh’n'easy) is a British company whose main objective is to break into our market and put American grocery chains out of business.
These people are very anti-union , so of course they’ll be cheaper on most products , mainly because they are paying low wages. Our economy is hurting pretty bad now, so the last thing we need now is to have from European company come in and try to put more of our businees out of business.
And there’s a reason these stores are so empty , they suck! The quality is no where’s near as good as Trader Joe’s or Vons.
So fay they’re falling flat on their face. I hope it continues.
I have returned to the F&E in Laguna Hills and noticed considerable improvement. I still believe they waste valuable shelf space by stocking run-of the-mill items like paper towels and detergent. I buy these in bulk from Costco or Target. I make most of my food purchases from Mother’s Market at El Toro and Paseo de Valencia in Laguna Woods even though I live in Aliso Viejo and F&E is slightly closer to me. I appreciate F&E’s small packages of fresh cut veggies; vegetable samosa; and pre-cut and spiced potatoes, but there is not much more that appeals to me. I can see; however, how meat eaters would delight in the variety of offerings of prepared meals. Also, too many of the breads and other items are extremely high in sodium.
Mother’s is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a big market, but it is power-packed when it comes to CHOICES. Some of the things that I recently bought from Mother’s which cannot be found at F&E include; Health Valley Whole Grain Organic Crackers; Alvarado Street No-Salt Sprouted Multi-Grain Bread; Ezekiel English muffins; Amy’s Light Sodium Organic Pizza; Health Valley no salt-added soups, beans and chili; dried veggie snacks; a lentil “cake” from the deli section; Amy’s low -sodium vegetarian lasagna; Silk soy milk; Silk yogurt; a slice of vegan pizza; Ma’s tamale pie (delicious); organic raisins, nuts and cheeses; soy cheese; Garden of Eden Blue Tortilla Chips; etc.
Also, I find that F&E’s lacks Mother’s variety when it comes to individual snacks. True, they offer single servings of desserts; but sometimes you just gotta’ have a single BIG cookie. I personally like Avanti Café’s Tangy Oat Chew; and willing pay the $2.75 for the single serving of the BIG ONE ( 3.5 oz). Mother’s also has a jar of tempting and delicious cubes of chocolate at the cash register.
Not to take business away from Mother’s, but F&E, your buyers should really take a trip there to see what sells in Southern Orange County. The store is ALWAYS busy (some of their customers are elderly health-conscious individuals from Laguna Woods) even though they are pricey; and they have living and breathing cashiers & deli counter help.
Per Luna, “In the meantime, Fresh & Easy chief executive Tim Mason told the Financial Times this week that the British chain could expand its neighborhood grocery concept to the Midwest.” I hope they realize there are regional preferences; and not assume “one-size-fits-all.” What sells in Anaheim may not sell in Laguna Hills; much less in Chicago, Metropolitan Detroit or Columbus.
Frank Knapp needs to wake up!!!
Who do you think owns Trader Joes??? It may have started in Pasadena over 30 years ago BUT for the last 15 give or take They have been owned by Aldi in Germany.
I say let the consumer’s decide! Everyone has a vote by shopping where they believe fits their lifestyle, tastes, and budget!
Given where the economy is heading, the family budget will begin to start making decisions on where they will shop.
Just you watch, stores will start selling smaller sizes and packs for the same price as the larger ones they used to carry in order to meet their margins. The store that is able to pull it all off; location (no one wants to drive far with these gas prices), quality product (best bang for the buck comparing apples to apples incl. size) and price, will win.
Trader Joe’s may be owned by a foreign conglomerate, but they pay higher wages, which means more money goes back into the local community.
Also, TJ’s capital reserve and market share are nothing compared to Fresh & Easy’s. Tesco owns tremendous amounts of land (some of which they sold to fund the U.S. venture) and it is the third largest food retailer in the world, behind Wal-Mart and Carrefour. It is Wal-Mart who they are ultimately competing against, even if it is smaller stores that are put out of business in the process.
I understand that Annonymous thinks that the family budget will determine where people shop, but if wages for workers were not so completely out of whack with wages for executives, this wouldn’t be such an issue.
It’s all about trade-offs. Nothing is ever really cheaper or free without someone paying the cost. If food is raised and processed in sweatshop conditions, or with little regard for the environment, is it really worth it to save some money on an apple? Tesco has been accused widely of putting the squeeze its suppliers in the 11 other countries where it operates, and they’ve said part of the appeal of the U.S. market is our lax regulatory environment.
As for mid-west v. socal…Is Starbucks any different in those two locations? McDonald’s? That’s the kind of retailer Fresh & Easy wants to be. They don’t want to be your neighborhood market that caters to the needs of the individual community where they locate, they want to be a predictable store with the same products, a majority of them inhouse-label, and they want to be everywhere.
What an eye-opener.
I am finished with F&E and have decided to fully support a local market (Mother’s Market) which has great fresh organic produce; a wide variety of items from which to choose; a warm atmosphere; and a helpful and friendly staff. I would suggest that others give it a try. They are located in Laguna Woods (Paseo de Valencia & El Toro), Irvine and a few other OC cities.
“I am a fan of Fresh & Easy, but I do find items spoil a lot faster then the exact same items I can find at Trader Joes, this is really disappointing. A bag of lettuce or collard greens should not go bad within two days (and trust me it will from Fresh and Easy). I will look at the dates on all the bags and they will all be the same. Makes me wonder how fresh it really is. I can buy produce at Whole Foods and it usually lasts over a week. ”
I had a few issues with their stores when they first opened and my options are basically Ralph’s, F&E, and Trader Joe’s or Albertson’s if I want to drive out of the way. I got in contact with F&E person who handles complaints and let them know some of my concerns: many of the foods are too high in fat, go bad within 2 days so I have to throw them all away (I was used to things going bad from Trader Joes but 2 days is ridiculous), not enough variety, and the store is already out of the basics (like bananas) when I go there like 7 or 8 at night. insane… I’ve found myself going there less in the past month or two but I’m willing to return and give it another try.
self checkout is fine unless you have a really full cart but most don’t - even though it caught me off guard at first. it’s also dumb that their cash registers don’t give cash back. what the heck? why should I pay 2 or 3 bucks to use the ATM?
of course, do away with the stupid gimmicks: Hybrid and Mommy parking spaces — absolutely stupid and combined with the handicapped take up half the parking lot so everyone else is forced to walk 3x as far as they would otherwise.
“The store that is able to pull it all off; location (no one wants to drive far with these gas prices), quality product (best bang for the buck comparing apples to apples incl. size) and price, will win.”
exactly true… no matter what certain people say about “capital reserve and market share”
Interesting that they’re bringing in an executive from Thailand to oversee operations. Even more interesting what happens if you Google the words “tesco” “thailand” and “lawsuit” — if you shop at Tesco’s Fresh & Easy markets, you are supporting a corporation using lawsuits and intimidation in trying to silence its critics. I don’t mind foreign owners in supermarkets or other industry here, but I’ll be DAMNED if I’m going to give a single dime to the foreigners at Tesco.