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Inside Whole Foods' New Corner Convenience Store In Chelsea
By
Scott Lynch
Published Mar 28, 2019
Modified Mar 28, 2019
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Scott Lynch / Gothamist
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By
Scott Lynch
Published Mar 28, 2019
Modified Mar 28, 2019
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Is the gigantic grocery chain Whole Foods, owned by the even more gigantic Amazon, now going after that most treasured NYC institution, the humble bodega? Maybe? Earlier this month, the vast conglomerate opened what they’re calling the Whole Foods Market Daily Shop, taking over a busy corner on Seventh Avenue and 25th Street and selling many of the usual bodega items with a fancier, organic, wellness-lifestyle-promoting spin. What even is a "Cranberry Energy Bagel Flat"? We refuse to find out.
To be fair, the Daily Shop is not quite bodega, and not quite Goop-inspired corner shop... it's modeled more on the suburban convenience store than the classic NYC bodega—there’s no cat, for one thing—and almost all of the items I saw are things they sell in Whole Foods proper (with similar pricing), just laid out differently.
What will you find inside? There's the coffee, which is sold at a full bar in the back, and comes in whatever complicated formulation you can imagine. There's also Matcha, Chai, Nitro Cold Brew, Deep Beet Juice, and "Seasonal Kombucha" on tap, as well vegan doughnuts, croissants, muffins, and the aforementioned bagels. There's no grill, however, which means no BEC—the nearest equivalent I could muster up was a bagel (hard, dry), a container of cage-free egg salad, a tiny crock of plain cream cheese, and, possibly the saddest thing I've ever purchased, a 25¢ pat of butter. Assembling and (sort of) eating it at the window counter was dispiriting.
Other items you'll find in here include artisanal pork rinds, fair trade peanut butter cups, no-sugar-added cheesecake, pints of Halo Top, roasted mushroom microwaveable burritos, cold sushi, tea tree oil dental floss, and of course, the latest copy of Paleo Perfected magazine. There's also a Build Your Own Açaí Bowl station, at which you can take a soft-serve "smoothie" and pile on as many berries, granola, and nuts as you like.
The place was fairly busy in the middle of the afternoon earlier this week. A young woman who works nearby said she liked the Daily Shop for grabbing a quick lunch ("we had these in Norway, I'm surprised they took so long to get here"), but maintained that it could never replace her neighborhood bodega in Washington Heights “because mostly what I buy there are cigarettes and five-hour energy drinks, and Whole Foods doesn't sell those type of things.”
Whole Foods Market Daily Shop is located at 260 Seventh Avenue, at the corner of West 25th Street, and is open daily from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m.
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amazon
bodega
Chelsea
whole foods bodega
Scott Lynch
Photojournalist, food writer, preschool receptionist. Love NYC.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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