Police respond to assault at Rockville grocery store

Rockville City police responded to a report of a 2nd-degree assault at a grocery store Monday afternoon, April 22, 2024. The assault was reported at a store in the 200 block of N. Washington Street at 2:09 PM Monday. Dawson's Market is located on that block, at 225 N. Washington Street, at Rockville Town Square.

Assault at Rockville grocery store

Rockville City police were called to a grocery store after someone reported having been the victim of a 2nd-degree assault there. The assault was reported at a store in the 200 block of N. Washington Street on March 15, 2024 at 11:22 AM. Dawson's Market at Rockville Town Square is located on that block. 

Police respond after assault at Rockville grocery store

Montgomery County police were called to a grocery store in Rockville Saturday afternoon, March 2, 2024, after someone reported having been the victim of a 2nd-degree assault there. The assault was reported at a supermarket in the 12000 block of Rockville Pike at 4:34 PM Saturday. There is a Giant grocery store on that block of Rockville Pike.

Aldi construction begins at Walnut Hill Shopping Center in Gaithersburg

Excitement is in the air at the venerable Walnut Hill Shopping Center at 16529 S. Frederick Avenue in Gaithersburg. Contractor HBW Construction of Rockville has begun work converting the former Weis Markets space for new anchor tenant Aldi. Renovations to update the shopping center's appearance are also underway at the property, as you can see below. 

Continue to patronize your favorite businesses at the center, as despite the tarps and scaffolding, all tenants remain open during the renovations. A second Gaithersburg location of Sheetz will add to the buzz at the shopping center in the future. The City of Gaithersburg recently approved the annexation of Walnut Hill into the city, in large part to secure the agreement with Sheetz. That Sheetz deal became a critical linchpin in Walnut Hill's plan to revitalize the property. Walnut Hill's ownership said the revenue from the Sheetz would finance the renovations to the center, property upgrades that Aldi had required as a condition of its lease. Sheetz opened its first Gaithersburg store last year, and shortly thereafter declared it was "highly-impressed with the performance" of the location.

Rockville Giant store to add electric vehicle chargers

The Giant at 9719 Traville Gateway Drive will soon add two electric vehicle charging stations outside the store, which is located at the Traville Village Center in Rockville. Giant began a partnership with Volta Charging to provide EV charging stations at its stores in 2020. The alliance was expected to eventually deliver more than 200 charging stations at the Ahold-owned supermarket chain's locations.  

“Providing our shoppers and communities free electric charging services is part of Giant’s larger sustainability efforts,” Giant Food President Ira Kress said in a statement. “We are excited to offer our customers who opt for electric cars the satisfaction of quick and free charging while they shop. It’s a value for our shoppers that also benefits the environment.”

Disorderly conduct at Rockville grocery store

Rockville City police responded to a report of disorderly conduct at a supermarket Friday afternoon, November 24, 2023. The incident was reported at a grocery store in the 15100 block of Frederick Road at 2:41 PM Friday. New York Mart at the College Plaza shopping center is on that block.

Strong-arm robbery at Rockville grocery store

A Rockville grocery store that has recently made news for the wrong reasons is back in the headlines again. Rockville City police responded to a report of a strong-arm robbery at a supermarket in the 600 block of Hungerford Drive Thursday morning, September 28, 2023. The robbery was reported at the store at 10:00 AM Thursday. There is a Giant store on that block of Hungerford Drive, where 3 people have been assaulted since August 11 of this year.

Rockville police respond to 3rd assault in 5 weeks at same grocery store

Rockville City police responded to a report of a 2nd-degree assault at a grocery store in the 600 block of Hungerford Drive Friday afternoon, September 15, 2023. The assault was reported at 12:00 PM. That's the same Giant supermarket where an employee was punched last month, less than 24 hours after another aggravated assault was reported there August 11. Friday's incident makes this the third time in five weeks that police have responded to an assault call at the store.

Rockville Wegmans opening delayed to 2025 (Photos)

With construction of the Phase 1 building of Twinbrook Quarter rounding into the home stretch at Rockville Pike and Halpine Road, many including me assumed interior fit-out of the Wegmans grocery store in the ground floor would begin before the end of the year, and that the Wegmans would open in 2024. But the Rockville Wegmans is now anticipated to open in 2025. Here's a look at the latest stage of construction at the site:

Police called after assault at Rockville grocery store

Rockville City police were called to a grocery store Wednesday night, May 24, 2023, after an individual reported having been the victim of a 2nd-degree assault there. The assault was reported at a supermarket in the 1800 block of Rockville Pike at 7:35 PM. A Safeway store is located on that block, at the Galvan development.

Giant limiting self-checkout to 20 items or less, due to "a significant increase in crime"

The other shoe has dropped in Giant's changes to its self-checkout system, and it's landed directly on the shopper's head. Self-checkout will now be limited to 20 items or less, due to "a significant increase in crime and theft that we and many other retailers are experiencing across our market area," Giant President Ira Kress said in a message to customers. He said the new limit, along with the weighing scale recently added to the self-checkout units, will "mitigate the impact of theft to our business."

Under the new system, parents shopping for large families, or anyone who prefers to get their shopping out of the way once a week, will essentially be forced to go through the traditional checkout lines. However, Giant has tended to shut those down as the evening goes on, angering customers who were averse to self-checkout machines. Kress did not specify if Giant will now keep cashiers at the old checkout lines until closing at stores. But he did acknowledge what will be a major impact on many Giant customers.

"We know that these changes may cause some inconvenience or be disruptive to the experience you are used to," Kress said, "and I assure you we are making these changes out of necessity to prioritize the safety of our associates and customers." A shoplifter was recently caught on video assaulting a security guard at the Bethesda Row Giant store. Corporate policy appeared to limit the guard's ability to escalate his response; even after being struck in the face, he could only plaintively continue to ask the shoplifter to show him a receipt. 

Once again, we see how the failure of our elected officials to respond to increasing crime - one of the most basic responsibilities of their offices - creates negative impacts for the law-abiding residents of our community. It's interesting that business leaders will admit crime is increasing, and is a major problem, before our elected officials will.

Rockville Amazon Fresh store: "Go big," or go home?

A long-completed but yet-to-open Amazon Fresh store filled with empty shelves on Shady Grove Road has become the local poster child for a nationwide freeze on Amazon's expansion plans in the grocery sector. Amazon successfully opened Amazon Fresh stores in Friendship Heights and Chevy Chase Lake, but the 270 Center store on the border of Rockville and Gaithersburg has been frozen in time since the fall of 2022. Yesterday, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy offered the first update on the cloudy future of the retail giant's bricks-and-mortar grocery adventure to the Financial Times, and it was a vaguely positive one.

Empty shelves inside the completed-but-unopened
Shady Grove Amazon Fresh store

Amazon plans to "go big" on expansion of its physical grocery stores this year, Jassy said in an exclusive interview with the FT. He said the halt he ordered on the openings and leasing of new locations cost the company $720 million in Q4 of 2022, and blamed the problems that warranted the pause on the pandemic. He said that now "we're hopeful that in 2023 we have a format we want to go big on, on the physical side."

That sounds like we can expect the Shady Grove store to go forward this year, and that the hysterical forecasts of all Amazon Fresh stores closing will prove to have been premature. Surprisingly, Jassy sounded more bullish on bricks-and-mortar stores than on the company's Amazon Fresh online delivery service, saying "people want to actually touch and feel" the foods they are buying before making a purchase. The FT noted that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos had promised to remain engaged on the grocery push after stepping aside as CEO in 2021. It's likely Bezos wasn't too pleased to hear the company hesitate on a plan that was meant to facilitate major growth in Amazon's online same-day-delivery service, which is dependent upon having neighborhood hubs like the Amazon Fresh grocery stores function as warehouses.

Bezos has a home in Washington, D.C. You can be sure he is going to be monitoring the progress of a Shady Grove store that is practically right under his nose in Montgomery County.

Rockville Wegmans construction update (Photos)

Phase 1 of the Twinbrook Quarter development at the corner of Rockville Pike and Halpine Road is now more than 8 stories above ground level. The 9th floor of the building is currently being constructed. Wegmans will be the retail anchor on the building's ground floor. 

Concrete framing and pouring is anticipated to be completed by late spring or early summer, developer B.F. Saul says. Work on the building facade is to begin soon. B.F. Saul says that when Phase 1 is complete, there will be more than three times the pervious surface on the property than when it was a shopping center