What's happening in grocery in downtown Calgary?

It wasn't long ago that there were at least six condo initiatives in and around Calgary's downtown office core were considering grocery stores in their spaces.

A year later, where do things stand? According to a recent Calgary Herald article, Loblaws will be opening a store in East Village that's slated to be 100,000 square feet. And Overwaitea Food Group's Urban Fare will be moving into The Royal condo in the ground floor retailer space.

But what happened with the other negotiations between grocery stores and condo developers in downtown Calgary? They may have faded into the background because of the nine grocery stores that already exist in the city centre, and four large grocery stores in the greater downtown area.

The article shares some math from grocery retailer experts: a large grocery store requires at least 30,000 people for its customer base to be worth launching a new store. With the four big players already in the area, they can service more than 120,000 residents. Tag on the other communities in a four-kilometre radius of Calgary's downtown core and you get 75,000 folks. As the article sums up, "Our great downtown communities are well served by the existing grocery stores--despite what some might argue!"

For the full article, click here.