Maloney on grocery store operating costs and sustainability
Maloney cites examples of public grocery stores operating at deficits nationally and asks about ongoing costs and self-sustainability. Peck says the goal is self-sustaining operations with the subsidy structure, with details to be worked out in the RFP.
And the $30 million for the La Marquette build-out, that's just the construction, not the actual operation.
Is that right?
Correct.
But again, the operation is going to be done by the third-party operator.
So we're giving the sort of subsidy for that ground-up construction.
To the operator to pass on the subsidy for the core basket.
Most models, if not all models, for public grocery stores in the United States operate at a deficit.
So there's, of course, the capital expenditure to get the grocery store up and running.
But then what is the projection of the ongoing costs?
Are we expecting these will turn a profit, that the rent and tax abatements will...
Allow it to continue without needing further capital assistance.
If you could just speak to the economic
Once the grocery store is up and running.
Yeah.
Again, we're putting in an RFI this summer, so these things are going to be worked out.
But the goal is for this to be self-sustaining operations with, again, with the subsidies that I spoke about.
And we're going to look at exactly how the subsidies are going to be structured for these core basket goods.
The key thing that we really care about, one of the things that is priority to care about is that they're meaningful savings.
And they're not only meaningful savings for these core baskets, but they're stable.
Because as you know, food prices can fluctuate, and so we want people to be able to budget.
They're going to know when they go to an NYC grocery store how much the eggs are, how much the milk is, how much the bread is.
And so they can budget each week and manage their finances that way.