Meijer Made Mini: Meijer Grocery #680, Lake Orion, Mich. (#12)

Despite being best known for their massive, Walmart-esque superstores, the Midwest's massive merchandise Mecca has experimented with smaller formats a couple of times over the years.

The early 2010s brought Meijer Marketplace, a ~100,000 sq ft grocery-focused concept tested at a handful of Chicagoland locations. Despite their smaller size and narrowed focus, these had a similar big-box environment to a typical Meijer, and a small general merchandise selection. The experiment didn't last; most of the locations closed (a rarity for Meijer) before the decade was out, and only one, in Orland Park, Ill., remains in operation today.

Meijer's definitely had better fortunes with their individually-named "markets," a considerably smaller grocery store format designed-and-built for urban areas. They've opened four across Michigan since 2018, and seem eager to continue expansion, as a fifth is currently under construction in Cleveland (plus that oddball "Fresh Thyme" in St. Louis). With them, they did an impressive job adapting to a ~40,000 sq ft space, proving that they can, in fact, successfully operate smaller stores. (The Detroit-area and Lansing locations will be covered in future posts.)

For their third modern foray into smaller grocery stores, Meijer Grocery, the company targeted a size in between the prior two. As the name implies, it's similar in format to a typical grocery store, spanning roughly 75,000 square feet, dedicated mostly to food and pharmaceuticals. The concept was revealed in September 2022, with two exurban Metro Detroit sites announced for the inaugural stores: 24 Mile and Hayes in Macomb Township, and Lapeer and Clarkston Roads in Orion Township just south of Lake Orion. Both were new construction, with the Orion store rising on the site of a demolished Kmart.

Both opened as scheduled on January 26, 2023.

I arrived at the Orion store as the sun began to set on opening day. At first glance, I was struck by how closely the store matched the renderings Meijer published with the announcement.

(courtesy PRNewswire)

The glass atrium on the corner reminds me vaguely of LiDL's early stores in the States. In it, employees were handing out reusable bags as opening-day giveaways, flanked by flowers and a cart corral to the left, and produce and the customer service desk to the right. Sandy lurked in the corner.

This is said to be Henrik Meijer's first receipt.

Proceeding into the produce and deli departments, the decor follows a similar theme to the newer "Imagine" decor used in the full-line supercenters, though with more gray tones and some lighter-colored panels. From what I can tell, most of the designs used here are exclusive to Meijer Grocery.

The color scheme continues around the corner, where meat coolers flank a massive selection of wine. A few faux wood accents and old photographs adorn the wall, sprucing up the black-and-white environment.

Taken directly from Imagine, however, are the aisle and shelf markers.

It's sort of odd seeing Meijer's usual vast selection of household merchandise condensed to just a couple of aisles.

In typical Meijer fashion, the pet department was expansive; while it lacked the fish tanks of the chain's full-line stores, it was above-and-beyond what you'd find in a Kroger or similar competitor.

If you want to watch animals from behind glass, however, the pharmacy provides a similar experience: massive windows on its corner allow passers-by a view inside (which might be questionable from a patient privacy perspective...). The pharmacy area's decor has a few common designs with Imagine, though also has a few unique touches, notably the faux plant texture on the health and wellness sign. 

Price scanner signs on this side of the store resemble the usual round checkout lane signs from Imagine, which don't appear in this store.

As you might expect from such a modern store, the checkouts were mostly automated: only four staffed registers stand alongside eleven full self-checkouts and four of Meijer's new shop-and-scan express kiosks.

Shop-and-scan is heavily emphasized throughout; the carts (which are black, not the usual Meijer blue) feature cellphone holders, adorned with the Meijer logo.

In what seems to be a Meijer first, this store includes a dedicated order pickup entrance, located to the left of the main entrance.

To the right is a separate bottle return room, by far the most bland part of the store.

I bought a pair of the new Meijer Grocery tote bags as souvenirs; only the generic ones, however, as they seemed to have already sold out of the Lake Orion-specific design by the evening.

All told, the new store's modern design was stunning, and it seems to make for a pleasant shopping experience. I hope we'll see more of Meijer Grocery in the near future - I suspect the concept was created in part for expansion into new markets; perhaps the chain's oft-speculated eventual entry into Minneapolis would begin with these.

Thanks for shopping Oakland County Retail!
Next weekend will see a doubleheader, with two posts covering the recent closures of Oakland County Bed, Bath & Beyond stores.

Across the Roundabout: Marshalls/HomeGoods, Farmington Hills, Mich. (#11)

The busy corner of 14 Mile, Orchard Lake Road, and Northwestern Highway, mired by construction as of late, is seeing some interesting changes to its retail scene nowadays.

Perhaps most exciting is the upcoming opening of a new bookstore on the West Bloomfield side; the former PetSmart in the Gateway Center will soon house the first Metro Detroit location of Schuler Books, a small Grand Rapids-based chain. Upon opening, it'll be the only major bookstore in Detroit's northwest suburbs since West Bloomfield's Barnes & Noble closed in 2016.

The news hasn't been so good, however, for the Hunters' Square shopping center across the road in Farmington Hills. Having already lost Gap and California Pizza Kitchen the year before, its 2022 has been marked by three major chains' departures. Buy Buy Baby closed its store in the former Borders earlier in the year, relocating to Southfield's Tel-Twelve power center. The chain's parent, Bed Bath & Beyond, will also be closing its Hunters' Square location by year's end.

The third departure was an across-the-street move, and one I never would've expected: the longstanding dual-branded Marshalls-HomeGoods store.

(March 2021)

Hunters' Square is neighbored to the east by a smaller stripmall, home to a fairly new ALDI, Burlington, and Party City, plus a former Best Buy, disused since its November 2019 closure. The two plazas were previously linked by a signalized intersection with Orchard Lake, before its replacement this year with a roundabout, as part of a resurfacing project, which I've covered extensively in a Twitter thread.

As work progressed through the summer on the traffic circle, some demolition activity began at Best Buy; the store's iconic pointed blue façade was removed in early August.

The yellow triangular lights disappeared too. (August 2022)

A new, and decidedly nondescript, façade began to take its place as the roundabout neared completion in October.

(October 2022)

Ironically enough, it was on a planned Sunday afternoon trip to Marshalls that I first learned of the space's new tenant, as I hadn't been in the area for a while, and, as far as I could tell, no public announcement was made prior to the move. It was hard to contain my shock as I saw the new Marshalls and HomeGoods signs on approach from the south.

A brown wall from Best Buy remained on the north side. (November 2022)

A note posted on the new HomeGoods's door stated that the store would open in seven days' time. I'd assumed, naively, that the existing store would remain open until the new one opened its doors, so I crossed the completed roundabout to pay it a visit, only to find that I'd missed its November 11th closing by two days.

(November 2022)

All of the store's signage was still in place, and the interior was barren, though a surprising amount of merchandise remained inside. It seemed that despite a steep clearance sale, almost all of the Marshalls stock had been transported to the new store over the weekend, though much of the HomeGoods merchandise was still there.

(November 2022)

The facade remained intact, and the marquee sign retained the store's logos. A few confused customers stopped to read the signs.

(November 2022)

Thankfully, the chain's sister store also has a location at Hunters' Square, which fulfilled my TJX needs for the evening in Marshalls's absence.

(November 2022)

This tiny TJ Maxx at the Square's south end will remain as-is, as far as I know, despite the relocation of Marshalls and HomeGoods.

Preparation work at the new store continued into the evening.

(November 2022)

A new marquee sign appeared on Orchard Lake before I returned to visit the store on opening day's night, November 20, 2022.

(November 2022)

Unlike its predecessor across the street, which had a single entrance and no divider between the Marshalls and HomeGoods sections, each half of the new store has its own entrance, and the two are divided by a wall. They're connected by two passthroughs, though, and share a set of fourteen checkouts.

Surprisingly, both entrances have manual swinging doors, and lack the enclosed vestibules typical of most TJX stores. Balloons greeted arriving shoppers, though there were no giveaways to speak of.

(November 2022)

I began my tour of the store on the Marshalls side, where I immediately noticed a more modern and spacious feel, though I was somewhat disappointed to learn that a new décor package had been rolled out to replace the one used in the old store's last renovation. I'm a sucker for the Highway Gothic font in retail décor, and I liked Marshalls's application in the old design. The new package retains the brand's usual blue-and-white color scheme, but with markedly more white space than before, though some gold accents added a much-needed pop of color. The two main fonts used in the new package bear a strange resemblance to those used in Meijer's 2010s decor.

Tell me this Franklin Gothic doesn't look straight out of a Meijer...

A bit of Highway Gothic still remains. (November 2022)

Heading north to HomeGoods, I found the passthroughs a bit narrow, especially with opening-day foot traffic volumes. I imagine this will prove a problem once the holiday season kicks off.

(November 2022)

Similar to Marshalls, the HomeGoods side was modern-feeling, marked by white walls (hardly a change from HomeGoods past) and a nice woodgrain floor, though it definitely felt more crowded. The woodgrain design extended, too, to the department signs.

(November 2022)

After a spin through TJX's newest retail establishment, I decided to walk over and take another look at the store they'd left behind at Hunters' Square. Within the week, its logos had been painted over on the marquee, and the entrance's sign had been removed.

(November 2022)

The fixtures within had been shuffled around a bit, and most of the remaining HomeGoods stock was taken across the street. All of the décor seemed to still be intact, and a few carts remained as well.

(November 2022)

New signs were posted in reference to the closure.

When will Michiganders learn that not every store ends in a '"s?" (November 2022)

I returned to the new store the next day for some more pictures.

The feather flags had blown over during the night; putting them back up was my good deed for the day. (November 2022)

(November 2022)

The typical beige plastic HomeGoods carts are in use here, adorned with a dual-brand label. Most of them were brought over from the old store, though a few of the small carts were new, with a different basket pattern.

Old (left) and new (right) (November 2022)

One of the larger carts has an older red label bearing both logos; I managed to track it down in a few minutes for a picture.

(November 2022)

This was certainly an interesting move. I'm still amazed at how quickly the store was prepared - it took less than four months to fully transform a disused Best Buy into a ready-to-open Marshalls and HomeGoods. On one hand, it's nice that the former Kmart plaza is now fully occupied, for the first time in years, but it comes with the cost of uncertainty about the future of Hunters' Square.

Thanks for shopping Oakland County Retail!