Hart's Local Grocers was an independent

grocery store A grocery store ( AE), grocery shop ( BE) or simply grocery is a store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday U.S. usage, however, "grocery store" is a synonym for supermarket, a ...

managed by Rochester Local Capital LLC. It was located in the East End Neighborhood in

Rochester, NY Rochester () is a city in the U.S. state of New York, the seat of Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, and Yonkers, with a population of 211,328 at the 2020 United States census. Located in Wes ...

History

The store was named after Hart's Groceries, which had over 100 locations in and around the city

by the 1920s. They were considered one of the first grocers to use store-brand labels and were also the first self-service grocery market. Hart's attracted considerable interest in

Downtown Rochester Downtown Rochester is the economic center of Rochester, New York, and the largest in Upstate New York, employing more than 50,000 people, and housing more than 6,000. History Rochesterville, as it was once called, was founded in present day do ...

, primarily due to downtown Rochester not having a full-services grocery since the closing of Midtown Market (formerly

Wegmans Wegmans Food Markets, Inc. is a privately held American supermarket chain. It is headquartered in Gates, New York, and was founded in 1916 in Rochester. As of , Wegmans has 110 stores, mostly in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions. T ...

Midtown) in 2002. The store's opening in January 2014 coincided with ongoing efforts to redevelop the former Midtown Plaza site on Main Street and the arrival in the downtown area of thousands of new residents in apartments and condominiums.

Lovely Warren Lovely Ann Warren (born July 1, 1977) is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 69th mayor of Rochester, New York from 2014 until her resignation in 2021. She was previously the President of the Rochester City Council. She was the fi ...

, the Mayor of Rochester, NY, was quoted saying, "For too long, downtown has been a food desert, our East End is already vibrant and the addition of will add to the vitality of the neighborhood". The 20,000-square-foot store carried local produce, dairy, meats and baked goods as well as a wide variety of prepared foods, offering online ordering and online shopping. The grocery, was independently owned and financed in part through a private investor group. The store was located next to the Little Theatre. On March 11, 2019, it was announced that Hart's would close after five years in business on March 24, 2019, due to declining sales and an inability to find a new owner.

References

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{{City of Rochester, NY Defunct supermarkets of the United States Companies based in Rochester, New York 2014 establishments in New York (state) 2019 disestablishments in New York (state) Retail companies established in 2014 Retail companies disestablished in 2019