Welcome news for Wilmington: 7 Day Farmers Market (Philadelphia)

My sadness over the demise of Pathmark on Lancaster Avenue–a supermarket I liked much better than the Acme near my house in Hockessin–has been entirely dispelled by its rebirth as 7 Day Farmers Market, apparently a close relative of the Newark Farmers Market. This is very thrilling news, since the new store is less than ten minutes from my house, and its selection of international grocery items, excellent and wildly varied produce, and basic things like paper towels is nearly as good as the Newark store. The only section that I noticed to be lacking/missing is the Arabic/Turkish aisle…but all the foods that you know (or don’t know!) and love from East Asia, South Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, etc. are here. It is a great thing.

Glad to hear you’ve got a good alternative to the Acme. And your post reminded me that I’ve been meaning to check out the new Amish Market in Westtown. I think I’ll head over there this afternoon.

Nice! I’ll be right out!

I hope they are cleaner than the Newark place. I stopped buying there when I saw how they handled their meat section. Uggh.

It does look cleaner in the meat department, in fact. The layout is essentially unchanged from Pathmark days, so it’s more of a standard-issue supermarket as far as the merchandising goes. I didn’t look too hard at the meat selection because we were shopping for other things that day, but both the meat and the fish counters looked reasonably spiffy.

I can’t wait to check it out

Got out there today. Nice place.

Fish look pretty good, but its early, if they don’t sell much it’ll be like George and Sons piscene artifacts.

Meat section is clean but limited selection. Cant tell about quality, spare ribs were priced fairly and looked good. Pork offerings were limited. I couldn’t find chorizo.

Veg section is really big but variety is less than Acme or Gigante (which I really like for the veg) and much less weird Asian stuff than the Newark Farmers Market (who has durian for pete’s sake).

I suspect the place and selection will evolve for a while. Glad its there.

Your impressions are pretty similar to mine. Newark Farmers Market definitely has better/more varied Asian vegetables, and I think Gigante has a broader selection of peppers. I did see chorizo somewhere (I was thinking of buying some, but ended up passing on it), so keep looking. On my one trip, they definitely had what I was looking for (two specific kinds of rice, among other items), and just the fact that it’s so geographically convenient for me will keep me going there.

I think they just need to get the word out to the immigrant community that they exist. The store was not nearly as bustling as Newark FM generally is when I went there, although the fact that it’s probably 3x the size may have something to do with that.

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While shopping at 7DFM yesterday, I saw a sign saying “Coming soon: Mediterranean & Middle Eastern.” Yay! This is what I found lacking on earlier visits. They still need to work on their merchandising though…yesterday the store was completely out of garlic. Garlic! Still, I got everything else I needed.

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