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Pyramid Foods CEO Erick Taylor: "Springfield's ready for an urban downtown store." The Bistro Market features a 24-foot salad and hot food bar, Starbucks Cafe and a 50-seat beer and wine bar.
Pyramid Foods CEO Erick Taylor: "Springfield's ready for an urban downtown store." The Bistro Market features a 24-foot salad and hot food bar, Starbucks Cafe and a 50-seat beer and wine bar.

Bistro Market sets sights on $10M

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Pyramid Foods CEO Erick Taylor believes the company’s new urban grocery store, Bistro Market by Price Cutter, will pump $10 million of annual sales into downtown and score profitability in its first year.

After nearly two years of anticipation by residents and workers downtown, the store opened Aug. 20 at the corner of South Avenue and Walnut Street in the former Wheeler’s Furniture building.
“Springfield’s ready for an urban downtown store,” Taylor said, noting the Bistro Market’s 24-foot salad and hot food bar, self-serve olive and gelato bars, Starbucks Café and 50-seat beer, wine and cocktail bar.

“The market research came back and said it should be profitable the first year,” Taylor said. “It’ll probably take five to six years to get a return on the money that we have out, but profitable the first year.”

Taylor declined to disclose Price Cutter’s research and renovation costs.

“It’s important to say that we’ve made a significant investment, and we’re confident in the downtown area,” Taylor said.

Visits to urban markets in other cities and two research studies, one by Kansas City, Kan.-based Associated Wholesale Grocers and the other by Minneapolis-based Dakota Worldwide, led Taylor and other company officials to believe the market would be successful.

Company visits included stores such as Cosentino’s Brookside Market in Kansas City; HG Hill urban market in Nashville; Trader Joe’s in St. Louis; and Whole Foods Market in Austin, Texas. Visits also were made to urban markets in New York, Chicago, Dallas and Boston.

The average size of stores in those larger markets, Taylor said, is about 30,000 square feet, making the 10,000-square-foot Bistro Market more in line with Springfield’s population.  

Only one urban market smaller than Springfield’s – Nashville’s HG Hill at 7,000 square feet – was visited, said Rob Marsh, Price Cutter director of planning and development.

The architect for the project is Bates & Associates Inc., and students from the Missouri State University marketing department led by Sheri Austin, researched the store’s name, logo, product selection and exterior appearance.

The store gives downtown a metropolitan feel, said Rusty Worley, Urban Districts Alliance executive director.

“We’re very excited about the amenities it offers residents and employees,” Worley said “It is a completely new style.”

John Presker, general manager of Pickleman’s sandwich shop, which opened Aug. 17 at 333 E. Walnut St., said he isn’t worried about the market’s presence and believes it will be a positive addition to downtown.

“I actually had no idea about it until you just said something, so I don’t think the owner or any of the corporate guys are actually concerned about it,” Presker said. “It’ll be great for the neighborhood. A grocery store with a big name like that is going to be great for the downtown area.”

Springfield businessman Morris Dock owns the building and said Price Cutter has signed a 10-year lease, with two options. Dock declined to disclose the lease rate.

Dock’s company, MoDoCo Inc., is renovating the top two floors of the building as loft apartments. Dock said half of the 12 lofts are vacant, but there are three with contract reservations, ranging in price from $250,000 to $390,000.

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