Roosevelt Island New Main Street Organic Grocer About To Open - Wholesome Direct Grand Opening On Monday May 13, Soft Opening Tomorrow
Hold on to your hats for this news. Another new retail store will open for business next week on Roosevelt Island's Main Street.
Reported over a year ago that Wholesome Direct, a gourmet and organic natural food market, signed a lease with Roosevelt Island Master Retail Leaseholder Hudson Related for the empty storefront at 530 Main St next to the Public Library. Learned today that the Grand Opening for Wholesome Direct will be on Monday May 13.
Wholesome Direct owner Dave Nasser was busy (Mr. Nasser pictured below standing next to cash register)
this afternoon with final preparations
for Monday's Grand Opening of Roosevelt Island's new organic grocer.
Mr. Nasser told me that Wholesome Direct will be open tomorrow for a "soft opening" in order to make sure everything is in order and right for serving the Roosevelt Island public.
Welcome to Roosevelt Island Wholesome Direct and Mr. Nassar!!!!!
41 comments :
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I am so excited. Joe Carbo-- I guess I am a hipster. I don't think organic food is magical (or even really more nutritious). I am, however, excited about anything that will make it less necessary for me to go in Gristedes.
I dunno, I just don't like the taste of the carcinogenic pesticides. I guess I'm funny that way.
Great that this health food store is finally opening on RI. Hooray!!
so excited to have another grocery option on the Island! Signed, a non-hipster new resident.
this store wont make it. this is why number one. the oldtimers in eastwood dont buy organic too much money.only the new hipsters moving in may buy from this store .then the people from southtown. some of them come down in the eastwood area on saturdays for the famers market as the walk very fast past eastwood. but many take the red bus. then you have the elite class of the island the people from oxagon tbese people never come to this part of the island. they take the bus to and from the subway and tram.they cover their faces with the new york times as they past the eastwood Area. to them this is y
No exactly a health food store. It's not quite open yet, but the paper over the windows was sufficiently removed so that I saw what appeared to be Boar's Head in a display case. Ho-hum. On the other hand, the cheese department appears marginally better than Gristedes' not that that isn't the easiest thing in the world to do.
the oldtimers in eastwood know organic is b.s. only hipsters belive this garage
Yeah, people speed up when they have to go pass Eastwood. Right.
"On the other hand, the cheese department appears marginally better than Gristedes'..."
I this the cheese department at Gristedes after the renovations are pretty much on par with the offerings of other grocery stores in this city.
Morton-Williams is a bit better (although not comparable to a real cheese store, of course.) Gristedes could be better, too, if anyone cared.
Well eastwood is the only public housing on the island besides 2~4 river road
Its not that organic food is better for you. Organic, as it means in english, is organically grown.
Meaning no synthetic pesticides nor any chemically treated fertilizers You can drink/eat all the pesticides you want and put it in your body all you want.
It doesn't mean that you are hipster, just that you are knowledgable.
It's amazing how much more pesticides, or genetically modified foods, these big companies shove down our throats.
I for one, just get everything from a CSA.
Organic food may not have a better nutritional profile than conventionally-grown produce, but there is no way that the petroleum-based or synthetic pesticides or the hormones and antibiotics that are fed to feedlot animals can be good for your health.
Joe Carbo's posts are the funniest on this site. I could never take him seriously but he is funny. It's like he is afraid of people who have jobs or incomes.
Agreed! What would we do without Joe Carbo! He is a hoot! Thanks Joe - for keeping everything jumping!
What the retailers who come here don't realize, is that if they were good, there wouldn't be hostility.
So true. Luckily the decision makers seem to be ignoring the "complainers" more and more these days.
Thank you. It's hilarious that everyone who is slamming organic as a "hipster" thing on this thread apparently can't spell or use proper grammar either. +1 for pesticides impairing brain functioning.
I was in the new grocery store. It looked good. Bought strawberries for $1.00 less a carton than Gristedes. The tomatoes were also cheaper.
Definitely go to this great new store folks! Very competitive, amazing prices! Great tea section - I know I sound like an ad, but it's true, I was blown away by the tea, and at very cheap prices too! How about a 20-bag box of organic green tea from China - for only $1.99! Can you get anything at Whole Foods for $1.99!? How about a huge, exhaustive even, selection of Bob's Red Mill - for less than 5/bag! Get the large variety of Fages at 99 cents a pop - which beats Costco on price and variety! Bring your shopping list over there and shop!! This store easily beats Health Nuts, Frontier, Westerly, Milennium, and of course Whole Foods. Also - wonderful staff, nice guys, very friendly! This is my new fav health food store - that is soon going to be more than a health food store when they start baking PIZZAS!! Check out the pizza oven behind the cash register - covered in cool mosaic tiles! Can you spell euphoria! Life on RI has certainly changed for the better!!
That is true Westviewer. I didn't notice a vitamin/supplement section (then again I personally don't use any except for calcium). Overall it isn't comparable to a Health Nuts, Frontier or a Westerly's, they have many more things, but it is comparable to the Millenium stores in Brooklyn. Although it's smaller than these stores (of course) I thought the selection was great of the stuff he has - such as the teas and the range of Bob's products - and the prices very competitive! Definitely worth checking out!!
Gristede's also has a large selection of Bob's Red Mill, with similar prices.
There have been big bags of breads sitting, unopened at the deli counter for at least three days. I don't know if these are intended to be used to make take-out sandwiches, or if they are intended to be sold by the piece. Either way the bread is already a little stale. Not a good sign, but I'll forgive them, since the store isn't really fully open yet.
I wish they would make an effort to provide some really good bread -- Amy's, Eli's, Tom Cat, etc. The bread bags come from a bakery I've never heard of. Maybe it's a great find...but I'll be very surprised if it is.
Many of the prices are very good, but not all. Buyer, beware. Sometimes, of course, convenience trumps price and I'm sure they are counting on that.
I've already bought a few things and continue to hope that the selection will improve. Some of the choices are odd -- like sugared Barbara's cereals. Gristede's has a much better selection. Believe me, I neveer thought I'd ever say that.
In addition to good bread, I would love it if they sold flowers, the way every other grocery store in the city does, with the exception of our own M & D.
Yes, the prices are all over the place.
He has some good "loss leader" type deals - such as the large bottles of OJ for $1.99, plus he spontaneously deducted money from the price of each item I bought when I checked out with my purchases the other day. But, I suspect he will have to follow the pricing policy of the Sweet Shop - peg the prices to the affluent layer who can afford them, rather than be affordable. The rents are such on Main St that he will have no choice. I wonder what slices will go for there.
Wow - I can't believe you are saying that. Imagine if he did have Eli's bread. I hope he doesn't just put in no-name commercial baked goods and still charge a lot for them.
What can't you believe? I don't mind paying a premium for quality, but I do object to overpaying for ordinary, which is the situation we have always had on Roosevelt Island.
So true!
Once again you are stereotyping. People of all walks buy organic foods when they can!
I've been in several times and I have mixed feelings about it. My one negative so far is their pizza. Although it is, in my opinion, much better than Nonno's, my concern is watching the guy make it. He wasn't looking exactly clean, and for a food handler, especially in a store purporting to be healthy and organic, he didn't even wear gloves.
Maybe. Why not drop off a box of disposable food-handler type gloves for him next time you stop in for pizza.
May I add my voice to Rilander's on this: A good business will not draw criticism, a lousy business will.
Converting the store into a scene is how WF was so successful. Then a previously onerous, un glamorous task - grocery shopping - becomes a fun activity at a destination, not just a store. You can gawk at the interesting crowds and gawk at the merch - and chances are you will also (incidentally) shop.
I can attest to that - as controversial as it sounds. The express bus doesn't need to stop anywhere along main st en route to and from Octagon and transit. Many of the pedestrian crosswalks are only yield crosswalks - not signed for vehicles to stop whether or not there are pedestrians in the crosswalk (so that if there are no pedestrians in the crosswalk cars/buses can just drive through them). Of course express buses appear to speed up or zoom down main st, since they do not need to stop except at the very few crosswalks with actual stop signs (as opposed to yield signs).
It too was privatized several years ago. Only market-rate apartments are for rent at Eastwood now - which explains the high turnover rate in tenants.
Didn't there used to be an actual cheese shop on the west side of First Avenue north of the tram?
Gristedes has a better selection of cereals. I also doubt if he's getting in premium quality baked goods. Any food sleuths want to look into the sourcing of our market's breads/muffins - go right ahead!
I dispute that Octagon residents are "elite"...do the research...rent at the Octagon is 300-500 less than any of the Riverwalk buildings. The building itself pays $100K/yr to have an express bus for 4 hours in the morning during the week. The building also pays directly for a FREE shuttle on the weekends. Just because the building provides better amenities does not mean the residents are "elite", perhaps they are just more savvy consumers of the rental options on the Island.
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