Colorado Real Estate Journal -
Natural Grocers opens a new store, and neighbors often cheer that they have access to fresh organic foods that is it famous for selling. In addition to its fresh food, all of its new stores, and recently remodeled ones, have something else – community rooms. Natural Grocers recently opened three new stores – most recently one in the Berkeley neighborhood in northwest Denver, one in Aurora and another in east Denver. They all have community rooms, which typically can seat around 50 people. In November, Natural Grocers opened a new store at 4500 E. Alameda Ave., in a former Gunther Toody’s restaurant space. “Our new location is about four blocks from our original one (at 5231 Leetsdale Ave.),” said Jeremy Jones, marketing director for the publicly traded Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage, which has a market cap of about $455 million. By moving into the Gunther Toody’s space, Natural Grocer’s was able to expand the size of the store by about 2,000 square feet to about 15,000 sf, which is the target size for its new stores. “That bigger store gave us an opportunity to carry more products and to include a demonstration kitchen/community room,” Jones said. Because it had been in the area for years, neighbors already were familiar with it. “And now we have a bigger space on a more visible corner, so we are drawing new customers, in addition to retaining our existing ones,” he said. Whether they are old or new customers, they now have access to an up-and-coming feature, the community room. And the store is not alone. “All of our new stores have a community room,” Jones said. Natural Grocers will host things such as free cooking classes, lectures on nutritional health and other free classes in the community rooms. When Natural Grocers is not using the space, it can be reserved by outside users. “It is free for 501(c)3 nonprofits and others can rent the space for $25 per hour,” Jones said. In other words, if you want the space for a Christmas party or a birthday or a book club, it can be yours. The store on Alameda has room for 47 and the most recent store to open, a 15,000-sf Natural Grocers at Tennyson Street and West 38th Avenue in Berkeley, can seat 52. The store replaces the Elitch Lanes bowling alley, one of the last family-operated bowling alleys in Denver. The bowling alley had operated at that site for more than six decades, before it was sold. Jones said the community rooms fit well within Natural Grocer’s mission to support healthy and sustainable lifestyles. The concept has been well received by shoppers. “They love it,” Jones said. “It really gives the community a sense that that this is their space,” he said. “Natural Grocers is more than a store; it is a gathering place for neighbors, whether they are attending a free nutritional seminar that we are offering or space they have reserved with us. We have really gotten great feedback on them.” He wasn’t exactly sure when Natural Grocers decided to make the community rooms part of every new store. “I know when we opened a store in Wheat Ridge last May, we included a community room and it was a big hit,” Jones said. Nationally, there are 106 Natural Grocers in 18 states, 36 of which are in Colorado. It is evaluating the older stores to see if they should be replaced or renovated. “That is a decision we make on a store by store basis,” Jones said. The Aurora store, which opened Dec. 10 at 3440 S. Tower Road, like the east Denver store, replaces an existing store. The new store is about 3,000 sf larger than the original one, which, among other things, allowed Natural Grocers to add a community room. The Berkeley store is minutes from a Sprouts Farmers Market. “It doesn’t bother us at all,” Jones said. “Our stores only sell organic produce and we took a stance a long time ago not to sell any product with artificial colors, artificial sweeteners or preservatives,” Jones said. “And, of course, we have a community room.” Other News NRN Investments LLC paid $1.17 million for 8,378 square feet of retail space to The Others LLC for the Flesher-Hinton Music store building at 3936 Tennyson St. in Denver. Mike Carnes and John Sheflin of Sperry Van Ness represented the buyer in the transaction and Rodney Gustafson of Case Commercial Brokers was the listing broker.