Sam's Foodline Closes | by Camilla White-Kirkpatrick (Algoma News Review / Jan 3, 2005)
Empty parking lot behind Sam's Foodline building, closed its doors on Dec. 21, 2004
Wawa is once again left with only one grocery store as Sam's Foodline (Picture above) closed it's (sic) doors on Dec. 21.
"High costs and low profits," said owner Sam Tremblay about shutting down after only 14 months in operation.
Tramblay had been store director for Loeb and had 26 years (of) experience in the business. He had opened his own store after Loeb had pulled out of the community in June 2003.
"We put a lot of hard work into it," said Tremblay about the store that, at it's (sic), had 30 employees.
Tremblay believes the town can support two grocery stores. "Our sales are very very good. The only thing was the start up costs, renovations and everything else was too much for us to handle."
He cites hydro as being a big expense. "$10,000 in 28 days - it was a killer."
"It's sad to see because once again the equipment and everything else is gone, this will be a one grocery store town for a long long time." Tremblay said it would be too costly to put new equipment back into the store as his is being sold.
He said if he and his wif Rosa had been able to keep the store running until Spring, he would have been able to mak a go of the business "but I can't make it until then. We have to get out now instead of losing everything we have. That's the point we were at. We almost had it."
There were others who were willing to invest in the business but Tremblay said he didn't want to risk other people's money. "It's sad for Wawa," he said.
The Broadway Avenue location has operated as a grocery outlet in Wawa since the 1940s.
Wawa's lone grocery store is Wawa valu-Mart (Picture below) located on Mission Road.
