A boutique grocer that pioneered the organic food movement 50 years ago is leveraging its earth-loving and healthy-living reputation to drive a Southern California expansion. The most recent sign of that growth took place on April 11, when the grocer, Erewhon, opened a 10,500-square-foot market in Santa Monica. It is the third Erewhon that the husband-and-wife-team of Tony and Josephine Antoci have opened since acquiring the beleaguered brand’s lone remaining store in Los Angeles seven years ago.
Photos by Carlos R. Hernandez, courtesy of Retail Design Collective
The market is known for its dedication to pure food — as in wholly organic, non-toxic and free of genetic modification — and likewise to its nature and health-minded shoppers, who tend to support smaller brands and to try new ingredients, says Tony Antoci, CEO of Erewhon. While Erewhon stores look different today than they did a half-century ago — the Santa Monica location includes a garden terrace, organic café, tonic bar and pizza oven, among other features — the mission and customer haven’t changed. Some 2,500 to 3,000 customers frequent Erewhon in a typical day.
“It is the demand of our community that drives change — from the supply chain to the shelf,” said Antoci, who previously ran a food distributor. “The Erewhon shopper is highly informed, and they are keenly aware how important what we put in our bodies is when living a holistic lifestyle.”
The Santa Monica location follows the opening of a 10,500-square-foot store in Venice and a 16,000-square-foot store in Calabasas. Future Erewhon locations include the ground floor of a former May Co. parking garage undergoing a major mixed-use conversion in downtown Los Angeles, and a yet-to-be announced site in Studio City. The Antocis aim to have a total of 10 markets operating in the region over the next few years, and then, perhaps, they will introduce the brand to New York, Antoci says.
“Because our private-label foods and cold-pressed juices are made in-house and are highly perishable,” he explained, “we have to remain mindful of maintaining our quality standards and make sure that we are able to deliver to the level that our customer expects.”
Whole Foods and a Gelson’s Markets operate near the Santa Monica location, reminders of the competitive threat posed by large and well-established supermarkets focused on wellness. But the quality of food and customer service experience set the Erewhon brand apart from its rivals, states David Sheldon, vice president of client engagement for Retail Design Collaborative, in Long Beach, the executive architect for the project. Despite Erewhon’s small footprint, for example, some 70 workers staff each shift.
“We feel pretty strongly that this is going to be the finest grocer experience on the planet,” declared Sheldon, whose firm has worked on more than 1,000 grocery stores nationwide over the last couple of decades. “That’s a lot to say, but we have found that shoppers really look at Erewhon as a pure destination.”
Erewhon first targeted the Santa Monica site about four years ago. The 1993 single-tenant building at the corner of Harvard Street and Wilshire Boulevard for years operated as a Magnolia Audio Video, a chain acquired by Best Buy Co. in 2000. Magnolia stores began closing about nine years later amid the economic downturn and after years of Best Buy moving Magnolia products in house.
In early 2012, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market announced that it would occupy the property, but the company’s bankruptcy in 2013 thwarted the plans. Erewhon signed a lease in November 2016 following the bankruptcy’s resolution, says Yuval Chiprut, principal of Slated Projects, a real estate brokerage and construction firm in Santa Monica. To accommodate parking, a building renovation included shrinking the footprint by about 20 percent.
Chiprut, who is shepherding Erewhon’s expansion, approached the Antocis about working together after they purchased the brand in 2011. He had co-developed condominium projects in the area but wanted to build something more directly connected to the consumer, he says.
“What I was able to take from my residential experience was the feeling you get when you walk into a room, and how that translates into a customer experience,” he said. “But condo development is not something that you can revisit and improve on daily, and that’s an aspect I really like about retail.”
Shifting from wholesale distribution to a retail operation has posed challenges, Antoci acknowledges. The top priority is to efficiently rotate new products into the store to satisfy inquisitive customers while maintaining liquidity with more than 400 vendors. But he also sees the potential for significant growth, a vision that has remained since the pair first considered acquiring the market.
“When we walked through the doors of the store and felt the collective energy,” Antoci recalls, “we both just turned to each other and, without saying a word, knew that this was right for us.”
By Joe Gose
Contributor, Commerce + Communities Today
