Foodie’s feeds need for upscale Southie grocery

Festivities today will formally mark the arrival of the long-awaited Foodie's Urban Market in South Boston.

After quietly opening last month, the 8,000-square-foot store at West Broadway and C streets has been fine-tuning its product mix to the wants and needs of a community that was in need of another grocery.

"So far, so good," general manager David Healy said yesterday. "There's been a few requests and complaints that we tried to take care of. The biggest complaint has been parking, but if you walk up and down the street, we're the only ones who have parking."

Foodie's has nine parking spaces, five checkout lanes and five aisles of food, with produce, butcher, deli, dairy, dessert and prepared food departments.

"(The dessert) and the cheese departments are my two biggest surprises as far as volume," Healy said.

There's also a four-foot section of Irish food. "We are in Southie, after all," Healy said.

"We love it," South Boston's Marie Krohn said after shopping there yesterday. "It has great produce. They have a great selection of cheese. They have the same selection as Whole Foods, only smaller. It definitely beats Stop & Shop."

Southie residents previously had to make do with the Stop & Shop nearly a mile away on East Broadway or travel outside the neighborhood to stock the fridge and pantry.

Foodie's prices match those of its South End store, as they share advertising circulars and weekly sales. The chain has a third location in Duxbury.

"The prices are high — it's Whole Foods prices," Krohn said. "But Stop & Shop has very high prices as well. We make them fit into our budget."

Healy has heard no complaints about pricing, but he's been surprised at the customer mix from the evolving neighborhood, where luxury condos are sprouting up to join new restaurants and, soon, Southie's first Starbucks. "It seems more like the young, yuppie crowd — 30-somethings, upscale," he said.

Boston police officer Jen Grogan stopped in yesterday to pick up lunch from the salad bar. "It's nice because they serve a lot of healthy stuff," she said. "It's nice for the community. The meats and the produce look a lot fresher than they do at Stop & Shop."

Today's grand opening at noon features a ribbon cutting with owners Victor Leon and Mayor Thomas M. Menino, free hot dogs, food samples, free Foodie's reusable bags for the first 100 customers and a chance to win an iPad Mini tablet.

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