Grocery Stores (Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Edmond: 2010, home, construction)

[houston transplant]

Originally Posted by Goodpasture

What ever happened to just plain country food? I've had sushi in Japan, dog in Bangkok, monkey in the Philippines, cheese in the Netherlands, some kind of meat that was unidentifiable in Tunisia, A Persian pilaf in Istanbul, Greek figs and oranges and lemons in Athens, pizza in Naples, ravioli in Rome, whistle and squeak in London, salmon in Scotland, Herring in Oslo, lobster on the beach in Nova Scotia..............in short, excellent food all around the world.......and some food I would rather not have again. But here at home, I can make a pretty good tapenade, a nice pesto, a good salsa, I can do tex mex, and Italian (you should try some of the Italian sausage schouse made from our hogs last year). Basil grows in pots. So does rosemary. So do chives. So does cilantro, and tarragon, and sage and all the rest the herbs needed to prepare great food.

Find a local butcher, and get some fresh, locally grown, grass fed, free range meat. Go to the farmers market and pick up some nice squash or corn or beets or turnips or green beans or asparagus or anything fresh and just picked. If you don't have a farmers market, find a farm......

Try some eggs from a place where the chickens are walking around the house. If you can't get to Claremore, get your milk and butter from Braum's.....it is better and less money than the supermarkets (usually). Get your honey from a local beekeeper (or get honey that is locally produced.......it will help alleviate your allergies).

Go to the supermarket for your other necessities......tp, sugar, salt, wheat flour, corn meal, coffee, etc.

Fixing good food has little to do with exotic ingredients.....it has everything to do with fresh and local......and unless you are on the north slope of Alaska, there are lots of fresh things out there to eat (there are on the north slope, but I am not that fond of blubber or polar bear).......

And Oklahoma has great beef, goat, lamb, pork, chicken and turkey. We have good farms. We have tons of wheat and corn. What more do you need to when you have quality local stuff? Even our catfish is pretty durn good.

Not to sound rude, but who has the time to make all of the above described stops in one's day. The point of this thread is okc deserves a
grocery store where you can get all that you describe and more!

[colleeng47]

Originally Posted by redbird4848

Sorry, to interject humor into this serious thread. But I saw this on the photography thread and had to run and fetch it to share the okie perception of high-falutin shopping.

Don't mind me. Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

OMG, I have to send this to my east coast friends. Tell them what Oklahoma is really like. That'll keep 'em out!

[colleeng47]

I get free range chickens, whole wheat flour, eggs, butter and yogurt, all locally grown from the Oklahoma Food Coop. They also have buffalo meat, beef and pork. As the season goes on there will be lots of fruit and veggies locally grown, w/o nasty pesticides. Info here: Welcome to the Oklahoma Food Cooperative - Oklahoma Food Cooperative - Local Food, Local Farmers - Farmer's Market, Natural, organic, health, sustainable, locally grown, meat, vegetables, nuts, produce, bread

[happytown]

Thanks for the link colleen. I believe Synopsis has already posted it.

I think everyone (like I have said before) is just going to have to wait. Of course OKC deserves a plethora of great grocery stores, but it might not be in Cornetts best interest. Remember he put the city on a diet! All kidding aside.....

This thread has become a broken record. Obviously OKC should have some good box stores where you can shop in one place. Considering all the money that is pouring into the city right now...NBA, Maps 1,2,3, 400 mil. Devon skyscraper, Indian cultural center, etc etc etc etc etc. you would think there would at least be one fantastico grocery store. But there aint yet. You have to remember that OKC just got out of its dark ages and Crescent has always been a road block to that fancy Whole Foods title.

Heres some helpful input. Has anyone emphasized Braums Fresh Markets?? They are great and offer more and more (literally every month), because the concept is doing so well. You can also get the best milk in the US at Braums. Braums headquarters are in OKC, so we are the test market and in return we get to sample any new idea that Braums comes up with first. Here is a link....
Braum's Ice Cream!

The new stores...

"The store is 5,756 (five thousand seven hundred fifty six) square feet with a stacked stone exterior and composition gabled roof. The interior has open beamed ceilings, stained concrete floors, track lighting and pendant lights over the guest tables and booths. The store also features a state-of-the-art menu board system featuring 42-inch LCD digital video screens.

“We’re trying to eliminate all of our older stores without drive-through windows,” Braum said. “Within the next few years our plan is to rebuild about 59 stores throughout a five state area, using this same prototype,” he said.

The new store will still have the traditional Fountain Area for ice cream, Grill Area for sandwiches, and Fresh Market for dairy, bakery, meat and produce. However, incorporated in the new prototype is a much larger Fresh Market with wider aisles, double check out counters, and automatic doors for easier customer shopping."
Shows design of store...
Braum's Ice Cream!

Here is a great link for those of you that are determined to go even further to figure out this dilemma....
What to do to get a grocery store downtown. - OKCTalk
Ask these people. They will be your best source. Good luck.

Link to all the stores...
Braums in Oklahoma City - YELLOWPAGES.COM

[Synopsis]

Braums is fantastic. "The City" (as I grew up knowing OkC) does deserve top-notch grocery stores. In fact, bringing in such good stores would actually HELP Cornett's diet program because those stores offer the best produce and good wholesome food in one place.

Good groceries are to be had all over Oklahoma with the co-op and farmer's markets. However, shopping around to all of these different entities is a little time consuming.

I'd love to see some Signature Krogers up there.

Don't worry, things like that will be coming to OkC because of the developments mentioned in HT's post. It'll not be long.

The market that OkC offers can no longer be ignored.

[houston transplant]

Originally Posted by Synopsis

Braums is fantastic. "The City" (as I grew up knowing OkC) does deserve top-notch grocery stores. In fact, bringing in such good stores would actually HELP Cornett's diet program because those stores offer the best produce and good wholesome food in one place.

Good groceries are to be had all over Oklahoma with the co-op and farmer's markets. However, shopping around to all of these different entities is a little time consuming.

I'd love to see some Signature Krogers up there.

Don't worry, things like that will be coming to OkC because of the developments mentioned in HT's post. It'll not be long.

The market that OkC offers can no longer be ignored.

I hate to be the one to burst HT's bubble, but I have been told by
two different inside sources with in the grocery industry that they
will not even consider opening in okc until the ban on beer and wine
sales are lifted. What is the plan to overcome this problem?

[flintysooner]

In a way Oklahoma City is ahead of the national trend. There have been several articles lately discussing the increase in Wal-mart's share of the grocery business while other regional chains are losing share. This just happened earlier in Oklahoma City.

I read that Wal-mart's 3.9% increase in same store sales for May 2008 was largely because of improved performance in groceries and drugs.

Tesco has begun their own entry into the United States grocery market with their Fresh & Easy stores. Wal-mart apparently was concerned enough about this that they hired a former Safeway and Tesco executive back in January to fill a new position overseeing the grocery business. Tesco stores are expected to be relatively small in the 15,000 sf range or a little larger than Aldi's. Wal-mart neighborhood markets are usually more in the 40,000 sf range.

It has been reported that Wal-mart is already the largest retailer of organic foods. I may have read that in the discussions about the Whole Foods and Wild Oats merger.

The Whole Foods shopping experience is interesting. Recently I've shopped at stores in Omaha; Richardson, TX; and, Tulsa. The Omaha store was by far the nicest. There I was struck by number of employees who asked to help us, the price of meat, and the number of people using the restaurant and buying prepared foods. We bought some chili ourselves and it was very good. The Tulsa store also had a lot of people using the salad bar which appeared to be in a new portion of the store. The Richardson store was much smaller and really seemed dated to me.

In Oklahoma City we use the Health Food Center quite a bit. It has a much greater offering of supplements and vitamins and so on than Whole Foods. It has a lot of the same snacks and chips and canned goods but just not as many.

The meat in Whole Foods in Omaha looked really good but was expensive. The most expensive thing I saw was organic tenderloin of beef that I think was $28 a half-pound. We didn't have an opportunity to try any so I can't really compare.

The Whole Foods stores are nicer though and the prepared foods bar and the little restaurant areas definitely set them apart. The fact that there are people who actually try to help you is really outstanding, too, although we also have that at the Health Food Center. The meat department in Whole Foods in Omaha was exceptional.

There are other competitors looking at competing in the Whole Foods niche. I know at least one is considering the Oklahoma City market area.

It will be interesting to see how this develops. I think it might be very difficult for Whole Foods to compete. Pratt's made an effort in Edmond just a few years ago with a very large store that was very much like what I have experienced in Whole Foods. I was surprised that store did not survive. I don't know if it was just too early or what happened.

[imbubbles]

I shop at walmart. I am a price shopper. Crest tries to say they are the cheapest. But nope. They just have a few things cheap when you first walk in just to draw you in but then blam!!!! Mostly high.
There are somethings cheaper there than walmart but for your total shopping experience if you go big grocery shopping walmart is the way to go. But still watch your prices on bigger quantities. They are not always lower. Sometimes it is cheaper to buy two small bottles of what you want then a big bottle of it. LOL

[grocerystoreokc]

I am still wondering this after living here for 10 years... I have heard it is because of the liquor laws that prevent alcohol from being sold in groceries or b/c of Walmart or b/c of non-unionized workers. What do you all think? would anyone be willing to form a group that could work on making a grocery store here or in Edmond? I don't have the time to invest in it but have some money to do so....

Originally Posted by Synopsis

BTW, there is a Whole Foods Market (used to be wild oats) in Tulsa if you are into a 3 hour round trip. Considering gas prices I think searching out the local institutions in OkC (of which I'm sure there are a more than enough) I doubt if this option would be worth the cost.

Whole Foods Market : Stores : Tulsa

And for the OkC residents, I'm not trying to promote Tulsa just trying to provide information.

[colleeng47]

Originally Posted by grocerystoreokc

I am still wondering this after living here for 10 years... I have heard it is because of the liquor laws that prevent alcohol from being sold in groceries or b/c of Walmart or b/c of non-unionized workers. What do you all think? would anyone be willing to form a group that could work on making a grocery store here or in Edmond? I don't have the time to invest in it but have some money to do so....

I have a problem with the liquor laws theory, because in NJ liquor can only be sold in a liquor store, and there is an ABUNDANCE of high end grocery stores (Wegman's, Whole Foods, Kings). Also, even the moderate priced supermarkets (Shop Rite, Stop and Shop) have gourmet foods. My only complaint about OK since we moved here is the lack of grocery choices.