Gristedes Owner Is Store's Critic, Too

 by Barry Owens

It’s no secret how Battery Park City residents feel about their local grocery chain, which is a frequent target of customer complaints, health inspections and even flaming online message board critiques,
“Nobody likes them,” said Mary Beth Lawlor, a member of the Battery Park City Neighbors and Parents’ Association. “I don’t know one person who enjoys our grocery stores.”

The Gristedes at 71 South End Ave. in Battery Park City, for years the target of residents' complaints. Photo: Allan Tannenbaum

Disgruntled shoppers can now count Gristedes owner John Catsimatidis among them.

In a message posted last month on a bulletin board at Battery Park City Online, Catsimatidis said he was not proud of the condition of his store at 71 South End Ave., noting that even his wife wouldn’t shop there.

“I’m not proud of this store. This store does not measure up to the standards of our other 49 Gristedes stores throughout Manhattan, including north Battery Park,” Catsimatidas wrote. “My wife, Margo, who is the unofficial quality control officer of Gristedes, would have a big problem with the southern Gristedes.”

Catsimatidis was responding to a message posted by an irate customer who claimed that the store’s meat products were “selling almost a week past expiration.”

More than half of the 18 health inspections conducted at the two Gristedes locations in Battery Park City during the past two years were prompted by similar customer complaints. According to inspection reports, consumers complained of spoiled foods, bad smells, roaches and rodent droppings.

Back in June of 2001, inspectors noted live roaches on the stairs, floor and on boxed merchandise in the basement at the 71 South End Ave. location. At the same location in August of 2003, inspectors observed live flies in the deli and produce sections.

Inspectors at the 315 South End Ave. store noted in a June report that prepared hot dogs, sausages, peppers, broccoli and corn were kept below the minimum legal temperature for ready-to-eat hot foods. Such practices can put custumers at risk of food poisoning. The store failed a follow-up inspection in September when inspectors found live flies on the walls and above a salad processing work station.

Both locations have passed their most recent inspections.

In his posting, Catsimatidis promised renovations and a higher standard for the southern store. He claimed the store suffered $6 million in losses in last year’s blackout.

“I vow at the earliest opportunity we will bring this store up to the modern standards of the Gristedes chain where

A customer shops at Gristedes. Many other food shoppers are ordering their groceries online.
it will pass the ‘white glove test’ of my wife,” he wrote.

“I look forward to serving the residents of Battery Park City far into the future and ask that residents bear with us as we suffered through the tragedy of the World Trade disaster, after which we rebuilt our north store to a highest standard, just as we will rebuild the south store once the insurance companies reimburse us for our losses.”

Catsimatidis told the Trib in 1998 that both Battery Park City stores would be renovated by the end of that year as part of the chain’s $50 million store remodeling project. While the north store has been renovated, improvements have yet to begin at the south store.

John Catsimatidis addresses complaints at a Community Board 1 meeting in 1998.
“We just haven’t got around to it,” Catsimatidis said last month. “We’ve done all the others. Someone had to be last.”
Future renovations will be too late for some former customers now accustomed to shopping elsewhere.

Gateway Plaza resident Beth Krumholz said she regularly shops at the north Gristedes location and was pleased with its renovation.

“I think the north one they made great strides in improving. I will buy anything I need there,” Krumholz said. “I’m extremely disappointed in the south one and try to avoid it at all costs.”

Others, like an anonymous poster responding to Catsimatidis on the message board, were skeptical a renovation would improve the south store.

“After a wonderful remodeling, [the north store] has returned to be the same smelly, dirty purveyor of moldy food and third-rate produce that it was pre-9/11. Have you ever wondered why FreshDirect is so popular in BPC?”

Indeed, FreshDirect officials say the neighborhood is one its most consistent marketplaces. John Boris, vice president of marketing for FreshDirect, said the neighborhood averages about 700 orders per week.

“They welcomed us with open arms,” Boris said. “We were looking at an underserved marketplace.”

Lawlor said she does nearly all her grocery shopping online. “I only go in [Gristedes] if I run out of an item. Even then, I’m in and out of there pretty quick.”

She, too, was skeptical that a renovation was needed to improve the south store. “It’s just another excuse. We’ve been hearing them for years. It’s pathetic that they can’t at least keep the place clean and keep the food fresh,” she said.

Catsimatidis said he understands residents’ frustration with the south store and then vented some of his own.

“If I’m going to keep getting my shoes broken about this, maybe I’ll just close it down. Maybe we should just have one store down there. That’s the way I feel about it,” he said.