What’s super about food markets

The arrival of Trader Joe’s, as well as the revamping of all our Laguna supermarkets, is reflective of the transformation that is taking place in the grocery business. The changing profile of the typical customer has forced the supermarkets to find a new identity.

Shoppers used to stock up once a week. Nowadays, they average a store visit 2.2 times per week, seeking freshness. There is also an increased demand for organic produce, fresh bakery products, artisanal cheeses and ethnic foods.

Since 1980, produce departments have gone from offering about 40 items to more than 400. Heavy competition from farmer’s markets has raised our expectations of quality and variety.

Discount stores like Costco, Target and Wal-Mart are seducing customers with lower prices. The Harris Poll revealed that the top five factors in choosing where to shop are: 1. Cleanliness; 2. High quality meat; 3. Good produce; 4. Accurately marked shelf tags; 5. Low prices and convenient locations.

All of our supermarkets are trying to provide a nicer environment and increased services. Albertsons and Pavilions with their larger square footage offer ATM machines, lottery ticket machines and coin-sorting machines.

All of them have hot and cold deli food, pre-made sushi, organic products, an expanded wine and liquor section, plants and cut flowers, firewood and beach furniture.

Pavilion’s offers a fresh soup bar, an olive bar, fresh salad and sandwich bar as well as a pharmacy.

Albertsons has a Starbucks Coffee bar and Dreyer’s fresh-scooped ice cream. Its plant section includes a mini-nursery where you can buy seedlings, soil and fertilizer.

Ralph’s features a sushi chef who prepares wonderful fresh sushi to order. In fact, all the stores have dramatically increased their selection of ethnic foods. Ralph’s has the largest department for Mexican products and fresh tortillas. Pavilion’s is strong on Italian and Jewish specialties and Albertson’s is best for Asian.

The variety of convenience and prepared foods has expanded exponentially from the early days of top ramen, roast chicken and potato salad to fresh yakisoba noodles, carnitas and pesto tortellini, etc.

There are hundreds of varieties of “helpers” and “just adds” to make meals at home a snap. You can get pre-prepped salads, vegetables and fruit.

Frozen hors d’oeuvres are found in enough varieties to cater a Jewish wedding. You can find fully cooked pot roast in a bag, pre-skewered and marinated kebabs and raw pre-formed cookies that you can pop in the oven for that homemade smell.

In a category all by itself is Trader Joe’s, voted the second most popular market in America and number one for price and service.

It has focused on re-making the notion of the store brand from a second-class citizen into the product of choice. Using tasting panels to evaluate and select the best products to bear the Trader Joe’s label, it is now known for its excellent store-brand products.

They have eschewed a fancy environment and an unlimited selection in favor of carefully chosen products, lower prices and friendly, helpful service. They were one of the first to practice “meal solutions,” a marketing technique that involves a kiosk where samples of a recipe, prepared on site, are offered to the customer, along with the convenience of the recipe and all the ingredients necessary to make it.

In order to compete, most stores are upgrading their in-house brands. We did a taste testing for chicken broths from our three major markets and compared them to Swansons which we have always regarded as the best, even though the priciest. Surprise, it came in second to the considerably cheaper Pavillion’s house brand (marketed with the Safeway label). After Swanson’s was Albertsons, then last was Ralphs. All the store labels were comparably priced.

Here are a few other supermarket products that we think are as good or better than any deli, bakery or home kitchen can produce: Pomi is the best brand for pureed tomatoes, it really tastes like fresh tomatoes are supposed to taste; Maruchan’s fresh yaki soba noodles with sauce, found in the cold case at Ralph’s, are the basis for a quick, easy and delicious dinner dish with the addition of chicken, shrimp, pork and/or veggies; Mountain High full fat plain yogurt is rich, creamy and less acidic than most and Bubbie’s Pickles are as good as Terry’s grandmother’s.

The supermarket in Laguna’s future may include a Shopping Buddy, already used in the Northeast, which enables you to download your shopping list and keep track of your total.

You can punch in your order to the deli and the device will beep when it’s ready. It has a map of the store so you can find things easily and allows you to scan your groceries, bag them and check out in a special fast lane.

Kroger’s (Ralph’s east of the Rockies) sells gasoline, Giant Super Foods in the Mid-Atlantic states has a staff nutritionist available for consultations and Publix in Florida has car-shaped carts for children equipped with small screens that run episodes of kids’ TV shows.

A lady from Cardiff complains in her blog that the new supermarket technology may have gone too far. In her produce department there is an automatic mister and just before it goes on, you hear the sound of thunder and smell the scent of fresh rain. When you approach the dairy case, there is the sound of cows mooing and the smell of melted butter. So far, she hasn’t dared to go down the toilet paper aisle.