Photos: Wegmans Debut Brought Cheerful Chaos To Brooklyn Navy Yard

Christopher Robbins

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Scott Lynch

Published Oct 28, 2019

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Scenes from opening day of the new Brooklyn Wegman's

Scott Lynch / Gothamist

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Christopher Robbins

and

Scott Lynch

Published Oct 28, 2019

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At 6:45 on Sunday morning, just as it really started to rain, there was a line of several hundred people snaking down a windblown stretch of Flushing Avenue across from Commodore Barry Park. First on line, a woman who had flown in on Friday from San Antonio, Texas, for the occasion. She had been there since midnight, strategizing with security. The reason for the excitement—the Wegmania, if you will—was, of course, the grand opening of Wegmans supermarket, the first of its kind in New York City.

There were no special opening day sales, nor any freebies for the first customers. And for all of its qualities—they've got it all, and a lot of it—it's still just a grocery store. One of the first people inside, a young woman in a Wegmaniac shirt, was loading up on chopped onions.

Essentially, there was nothing here on Sunday that you can't get here today, or next month. Though judging by the customer love, packed parking lot, and backed-up traffic in all directions, maybe this area will just always be like this now, a not-so-little slice of suburbia at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

“As Biggie said, it was all a dream,” New York Attorney General Tish James told a crowd of VIPs on hand for the ribbon-cutting in a space overlooking the Wegmans parking lot on Admiral’s Row.

James and other public officials, including U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul, and Deputy Mayor Vicki Been, all praised Wegmans for their commitment to hire staff from the neighborhood—more than 11,000 people live in the three NYCHA complexes right next to the new store. Of the 500 new jobs that Wegmans says they created in Brooklyn (150 of them full-time), 214 positions were filled through the company’s community outreach program. (The company's grocery store workers are not unionized.)

“This is hundreds of great jobs for people who would otherwise be locked out of the labor market. And they’re not dead-end retail jobs, they’re not minimum wage and stuck for life,” Douglas Steiner, the developer on Admiral's Row and the head of his eponymous development firm. “They have training year in year out, not just for new employees. This is an exceptional company.”

Asked if he was concerned that the congestion from the 700-car parking complex would prevent people from taking the bus or riding a bike to the new Wegmans, Steiner noted that he has been biking since he was 16 years old.

“We added two driveways that did not exist before. If that’s the price for 2,000 great jobs that’ll be here—we have signals there, I certainly hope it’s safe and we want it to be safe,” Steiner said.

Steiner added, “We don’t require people to drive here they can get here however is easiest for them. It’s not for us to dictate their means of travel. My greatest hope is that the parking spaces are not needed, and then I can add some more square footage where it’s a parking lot now.”

When we asked Chuck Schumer about the congestion (Schumer recently penned an op/ed for the Times about clean car technology), the senator replied, “Well, I believe in mass transit,” and left it at that.

Schumer’s daughter Jessica, who is the executive director of the Friends of the Brooklyn Queens Connector, a developer-backed group that supports Mayor Bill de Blasio’s streetcar, was also on hand for the opening ceremony. The BQX route would run directly through the Navy Yard.

The majority of Wegman’s 72,000 square feet footprint is given over to the take-home prepared food refrigerators, the eat-in stations (there's a Burger Bar, an "Authentic Italian Pizza" area, a Salad Bar, the Buzz Coffee Bar, and a huge Sushi and "Asian" counter), the mountains of produce, and specialty sections like cheese, deli, seafood, meat, and a massive bakery. There's a patio outside with tables and chairs for about 40, and seating on the second floor for at least 100 more in a series of intimate spaces. This upstairs area also includes a lounge-like liquor bar (hopefully those who partake are using mass transit).

Compared with all that abundance, the packaged grocery aisles to the left of the entrance seem relatively ordinary, though still likely larger and with more variety—the Oreo display, in particular, is crazy—than wherever it is you're shopping now. The prices everywhere, particularly on the Wegmans-branded products, were on the less expensive side, and one manager said they would remain that way, that this wasn't some sort of opening-season bait-and-switch gambit. There's a wall of different craft beers, a whole section of meatless "meats," lots of organic everything, and two separate Kombucha cases that everyone joked about.

Wegmans is renowned for its customer service, and there’s no reason to suspect that the management will allow the relentless good cheer to fade, though the YMCA-like dance the entire crew did when the doors first opened, spelling out "WEGMANS" with their arms while shouting out each letter, is apparently not an everyday occurrence.

“I’ve lost track of time. I feel like I’m in a casino. I could be here all day. It’s unbelievable,” said Amelie Francois, who was marveling at the prepared pizzas. Francois had driven there from Forest Hills, Queens, with her roommate, Kenneth Yu. The trip took them 45 minutes.

“I went to school in Rochester so I’m very familiar with Wegmans, which is why I wanted to bring her to the opening,” Yu explained.

Francois said they’d likely be back.

“There’s a quiche section. I mean, what even is life?” she said. “If you’re driving, I’m getting in the car. It’s gonna be the Church of Wegmans.”

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Christopher Robbins

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Christopher Robbins is a New York City reporter covering transportation, affordable housing, local politics, and criminal justice. His work has also appeared in New York Magazine, The Village Voice and The New York Times. Chris is a graduate of Patrick Henry High School in Roanoke, Virginia, and enjoys biking to Fort Tilden in the summertime.