CityScape's New Oakville Grocery: Lifeline, or Anchor?

By Wynter Holden Tue., Mar. 22 2011 at 12:03 PM

Categories: News

The signs for Oakville Grocery are up at Phoenix's CityScape development, and according to the PR machine the store is "in its final phases of construction and design." The California-based gourmet market shuttered the doors of its Scottsdale Quarter location this past January after a little over a year in the space. The new branch will carry many of the same products, with a focus on locally farmed dairy and meats, imported gourmet foods, and grab-and-go pizzas and salads made by an in-house chef. They're currently seeking community growers for their locavore lineup.

Oakville has the potential to boost CityScape's visibility with locals. The idea of having a grocery store in downtown Phoenix is pretty appealing. If you work downtown like us, you could grab a few essentials on lunch break, or swing by after five and finish your weekly shopping without having to trek out to the suburban supermarkets and play parking lot tiddlywinks.

But is CityScape the best place to open? A few months ago, we questioned their ability to sustain without a ton of advertising -- and our concerns still remain.

Until Sam Fox's Arrogant Butcher joined the urban development in February, CityScape was devoid of a real dining destination. There are a few token fast-food joints, and Aaron May's tiny Vitamin T taco shop, but it's not exactly a draw for gourmet foodies. The complex also houses Lucky Strike Lanes, which has potential as a nightlife destination but is still relatively unknown, and an Urban Outfitters that has thus far failed to draw the young, loft-dwelling urbanites it usually attracts.

With the mass summer exodus fast approaching, now seems like a strange time to open a store that relies heavily on local traffic. Perhaps Oakville's wine and beer selection will be enough to draw the remaining desert dwellers out of our air-conditioned havens; but if Oakville sinks like an anchor, we could end up with another multi-million dollar eyesore dominating the landscape.

Tags:

cityscape, grocery store, oakville grocery, shittyscape, supermarket

We Recommend

Casidy

We were sorry to see Oakville Grocery move - just as Scottsdale Quarter got hopping. Hope all goes well for you at CityScape

Connor

I'm glad that there will be tenants for CityScape, but is anyone else concerned about Oakville providing competition to the Public Market? Maybe I'm missing something...

Oliveurban

To be fair, Arrogant Butcher is not a magnet for "gourmet foodies," Urban Outfitters' demo is acutely not "loft-dwelling urbanites," and, if you've visited Lucky Strike on the weekends, I'd think it's safe to say it's been discovered by more than enough locals.

CityScape is not Downtown's savior, and we shouldn't give it that much credit. Unrealistic expectations bring unrealistic (and unfair) criticism. It's a component to the area, another piece to a larger puzzle. "Perfect" is the enemy of simply doing good, and while CityScape could have been executed better in several aspects, Downtown is clearly, if only by a little bit, a more cohesive entity because its existence.

#justsayin