Wegmans comes to Richmond, Va!

Wegmans (a fantastic grocery store for the poor souls who have never heard of them!) just opened their first store in the Richmond, Virginia area - and another one will be opening soon.  My son and daughter in law, both raised in Rochester, grew up with Wegmans.  They have lived down South for ten years and had to be without a Wegmans in their life!

Wegmans is 100 years old this year.  They started out selling fresh produce in a push cart in Rochester.  When I moved to Rochester in 1974, there were Loblaws and Star Markets.  They couldn't compete with Wegmans and have long since disappeared.

Recently, our local newspaper had a huge article on Wegmans in a Sunday paper.  Wegmans is trying to turn this area of the country into the Silicon Valley of food.  They have contracted with local farmers for both produce and meat.  Many of these farms will openly tell you, they would have gone out of business were it not for Wegmans.  The benefit to the consumer, fresher grocery items.

Today, Wegmans is managed by Danny Wegman and his two daughters.  As teenagers, Danny insisted that Nicole and Colleen work in the stores at the lowest levels.  He knew that by doing this, they would learn the business inside and out.

Wegmans has come a long way since I moved here 40+ years ago.  Today there are in store bakeries, flower shops, general merchandise, and more.  They know how to treat the customer.  A year or so back, when they made the top of the list of the Best Place to Work in the country, each store had a HUGE sheet cake to celebrate.  It was the size of a sheet of plywood.

If you go in a Wegmans and ask where a product is, they don't just tell you, they will walk you there.

More recently they have increased their private brands and most of these that I have tried are as good or better than the name brand items.