Store Completely Remodeled After Fire
By Matthew Goldberg
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
BROOKLYN HEIGHTS — The Gristedes supermarket at 101 Henry St. in North Brooklyn Heights reopened Friday morning – finally, and with extravagant splendor.
John Catsimatidis, owner, president, chairman and CEO of the Red Apple Group and Gristedes Foods, hosted the event and was on hand to greet customers and speak with the media as a vast array of refreshments was served.
Catsimatidis, who has been in the business for 40 years, said the remodeled store will “enhance the neighborhood,” with a host of new services including a new café, a nicer produce section and pharmacy and a new sushi station.
Borough President Marty Markowitz was also on hand to celebrate the gala event, stating that the store in its new incarnation will be “a great service for Brooklyn Heights.” This Gristedes will be — and is — “bigger and better than ever,” he said.
Customers from around the neighborhood strolled into the store all morning, wide-eyed and eager to take a gander at the remodeling.
A lavish supply of breakfast foods, juice, coffee, wine and pastries were given out for free. In addition, there will be free 12-ounce cups of Chock Full o’ Nuts coffee all week, said Fashone, an employee at another Gristedes location in Brooklyn who was on hand to help out for the event.
Susan, who worked at this location prior to the fire and has been with Gristedes for about two years, said she was “very happy to be back.” The new store is “totally, totally different.”
Marty Ellman, who works as a real estate agent at Prudential Douglas Elliman over on Montague Street and has lived in the neighborhood for 30 years, called the new store a “major improvement” from the old Gristedes here. They’ve “taken it up 12 notches” from its previous incarnation, she said.
She had paused with her cart at the deli section to sample a thin slice of the Buffalo-style roasted turkey (which has a bit of a kick to it).
After taking some time to explore the new digs, she said that she “didn’t like the old store, but used it a lot.” If nothing else, it was “convenient,” although often a little dirty, cramped and under-maintained — comments shared by many other customers.
Ethel “Mimi” Little, who has been living in the co-op at 75 Henry St. for 19 years and in the neighborhood for 30, said, “The layout is so stunning!”
No walls were torn down in the remodeling, but by moving things around and using the space more economically, the store does appear much larger than it did before.
“Where did they get all this room?” Little asked, staring in amazement at the new expanse and use of the space. While she was being interviewed, another customer interjected to say, “I need a road map” to get around with all the new stuff.
It was noted by a few customers, and this reporter, that the prices in general are a little higher than some neighborhood alternatives, which was also the case here prior to the fire.
Catsimatidis stated that some of the problems in getting the store up and running again were related to the overly strict regulations in this city regarding permits, although he acknowledged that some of those regulations were in place for a reason.
Charles Criscuolo, a senior executive vice president at Gristedes Foods, cited some of the problems he oversaw as sorting out issues with “insurance  building permits  and dealing with the landlord.”
Like the other executives on hand, Criscuolo was aware of how long it took the store to reopen in consideration of the neighborhood’s plight. But, he added, once the permits came through, everything fell into place quite quickly and came together “within 75 to 90 days.”
The cause of the blaze was “a little electrical fire above the deli department” that then spread, Catsimatidis told this reporter in a phone interview back in April. Gristedes employees had “tried to put out the fire with fire extinguishers, but it got out of control.”
Last April, Catsimatidis had estimated the survey of the damage from the insurers to be about $5 million. This estimate was to include the installation of new refrigerator units and new shelving as, according to insurers then, it was “impossible to get the smell [of the fire and smoke damage] out of the old equipment.”
“It was a minor problem, which became a major problem,” Catsimatidis said.
As for future of Gristedes and this borough, Catsimatidis said that “Brooklyn has come a long way,” and he hopes to increase the chain’s presence in developing neighborhoods. And for the people of Brooklyn Heights, he is pleased to have provided them with “a great shopping environment.”
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© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2008
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