A line of eager shoppers formed outside the new Safeway at 950 W. Hamilton Ave. in Campbell just before 8 a.m. Friday, for the grand opening of the supersized supermarket.
The first wave of customers packed the parking lot within the first half-hour of business. Discounted meats and across-the-store sales—like $1.99 for sugar, Cheerios, Capri Sun drinks and juices—filled all six self-checkout stations and lined more than half of the 10 cashier lines with customers.
“I’ve been shopping at Safeway all my life,” said Zane Villars, 73, a retired Southern California resident visiting Campbell to house-sit for his daughter. “I’m here for the grand opening, because they’ve got some terrific buys.”
Villars also attended Thursday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony when Safeway welcomed residents and Campbell administrators for a celebratory food tasting in anticipation of the grand opening. “Everywhere I went, everybody was so helpful,” he said. “They were great.”
If you were wondering what the new 55,000-square-feet Safeway was going to have inside once it opened, the answer was simple—everything. The gigantic store has the layout of a typical supermarket, except that instead of a produce section off to one side, it stretches across the store just beyond the checkout lines.
The grocery store has an expanded bakery and deli, a large floral section, a full-service meat and seafood department, pharmacy, ready-to-eat Asian cuisine food station and delicatessen with its own sushi chef, an antipasti bar and, of course, a Starbucks with a 10-table seating area and free WI-FI.
The accompanying Safeway fueling station on the corner of Marathon Drive and West Hamilton Avenue is the first in the area. Safeway Club Card members save 3¢ per gallon when they fill up at the station.
“We’re very excited to be opening in Campbell,” said Kara Knoe, Safeway’s public affairs manager. “We think it’ll be a nice addition to the city.”
Residents also expressed excitement for the new market. “It was awesome,” said Diane Knudsen, a stay-at-home mom in Campbell. “They have everything you need in a one-stop shop.”
Both local and regional Safeway managers came out this morning to help organize activities and facilitate the store’s launch.
The new 252-employee supermarket combined some staffing from two recently closed stores (West Park Plaza Shopping Center and Westgate Shopping Center) and created 170 new jobs, management said.
Over the weekend the supermarket will be giving away hundreds of bags of groceries to shoppers and will setup 25 sampling stations throughout the store to celebrate its grand opening.
