Hy-Vee Plans 2 New Mo. Stores

WEST DES MOINES, Iowa -- Hy-Vee Inc. here has leased sites for two stores in Columbia, Mo. that are expected to open within the next year.

"It’s a good market for us, and we’ve been looking for quite some time," Hy-Vee spokeswoman Chris Friesleben was quoted as saying in local press reports. "The stars just lined up correctly, and we ended up with two properties."

Hy-Vee will lease the vacant Wal-Mart in the Rock Bridge Shopping Center at Providence Road and Nifong Blvd. and the former Mega Market building in the Broadway Marketplace at 25 Conley Road, both of which are owned by The Kroenke Group.

Friesleben said the chain this fall will raze the former Wal-Mart store, which closed earlier this year shortly before relocating with a Supercenter in the nearby Grindstone Plaza, with a tentative completion date scheduled for fall of 2008. Construction on the upcoming Hy-Vee at the former Mega Market is expected to begin in the spring.

Hy-Vee opened its first Columbia, Mo. store in August 2001.

The employee-owned Hy-Vee operates 224 retail stores in seven Midwestern states. For 2006 the company recorded total sales of $5.3 billion, ranking it among the top 20 supermarket chains and the top 40 private companies in the U.S.


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