Feb. 29--A long-awaited Mariano's grocery store is set to open in Westmont in March.
The 71,300-square-foot store near 63rd Street and Cass Avenue will likely open after March 14, according to Westmont Mayor Ron Gunter. He said the mild winter allowed construction crews to prepare the site and to construct the building quickly.
"Construction started in late summer and it has been non-stop since that time," Gunter said. "We are very excited about it. We were told they can easily make a million in sales a week."
Westmont finance director Spencer Parker said in an email that the village could net around $225,000 in sales taxes per year.
The facade of the structure -- which matches most other Mariano's stores in the region -- includes brick, stone and a glass food court atrium area. The store has various specialty items and areas like a coffee shop, gelato area, wood-fired pizza oven, sushi bar and a pharmacy. The Westmont location will be the 36th Mariano's store in the region, according to its website.
Gunter said he hopes the store will act as an "anchor" to help stimulate new businesses to move to vacant storefronts on the south end of town.
The adjacent former Westbrook Market grocery store closed down in November.
The owner, Joe Kumkoski, told trustees in 2013 that the new Mariano's store would take business away from him.
"I am concerned about the impact this plan will have on my business and my employees," Kumkoski said to the board. "I feel I will not be able to compete on an even playing field."
Westbrook Market was open for 12 years and employed about 60 people in 2013, he said.
Kumkoski would not comment further when reached recently.
Gunter said he thought the store's closing was unusual because it occurred just before the holiday shopping season. Gunter also believed that Mariano's would not have a negative impact on Westbrook because they had a specific niche selling many types of ethnic foods including Polish, Asian, Latino and Indian foods.
By no means, however, is the general area a food desert. Within a three-mile radius of the new Mariano's site, there are three Jewel-Osco stores, a Whole Foods Market, a Trader Joe's, an Angelo Caputo's Fresh Market, a Standard Market, a Brookhaven Marketplace, and two Aldi stores, among other retailers who sell food.
Bradford Real Estate of Chicago closed on the sale of the 9.5-acre Mariano's on Sept. 5, 2014. The site was one of the last undeveloped parcels of land in the village. Westmont officials signed off on a $3 million incentive deal with Bradford in 2013. The real estate company will also receive 50 percent of sales taxes generated by the new store for a certain time period.
Other incentives from the village included funds for construction of an underground water detention area, road signals and wetland mitigation, according to the village.
