Meijer plans to spend $80 million to remodel a dozen stores in southeast Michigan, the Grand Rapids retailer announced today.
The company said the remodels are part of a larger, $400-million investment to build nine news stores, including two in Michigan, this year, and make enhancements -- including wider aisles, redesigned floor plans, better signs, and bigger produce, meat, dairy and health and beauty sections sections -- to 32 stores.
“We will continue our process of slow, steady growth,” Hank Meijer, Meijer's CEO, said. “This plan has allowed us to remain focused on our customers and team members, while growing our business and ensuring we continue to innovate in the marketplace.”
The plan, the company said, also calls for more technology to make the stores brighter and more energy-efficient.
Meijer plans to remodel stores come on the heels of efforts from Cincinnati, Ohio-based Kroger, to build larger-format stores in Michigan, and its acquisition of Hiller's supermarket stores in metro Detroit. In January, a Kroger opened in Roseville.
Since 2010, Meijer has opened 36 new stores, and remodeled dozens of others. In the past two years, the company opened two stores in Detroit, one off on 8 Mile, and one on Grand River.
The planned new supercenters -- which offer groceries, home goods and pharmacies -- are slated to open in: Sturgis and Flat Rock in Michigan, Owensboro in Kentucky, Evansville and Indianapolis in Indiana, Round Lake Beach and Flossmoor in Illinois, and Sussex and Waukesha in Wisconsin.
The company, which now operates 224 stores in six states, estimates it will add about 300 jobs -- full- and part-time -- to each new store.
The remodels will focus on key markets such as metro Detroit, Indianapolis and Ft. Wayne, Ind. In southeast Michigan, the stores set to be remodeled are in Allen Park, Clinton Township, Lapeer, Lenox, Marysville, Port Huron, Roseville, Royal Oak, Shelby Township, Southfield, Warren and Wixom.
The company said the upgrades will include improvements to lighting, heating, refrigeration and parking lots.
Meijer said work on the Roseville location began last month and is expected to take about six months.
