09/11/2024

Amazon is Opening Fresh Supermarkets after Yearlong Stall

However, many locations remain vacant

On a humid afternoon in August, a few hundred shoppers lined up outside an Amazon Fresh supermarket in a Philadelphia suburb, eagerly awaiting the store's grand opening. A person in a banana costume hyped up the crowd, while Amazon staffers handed out free samples of cold brew coffee.

The event was a long time coming. Since 2022, the Fresh store in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, looked ready to open. But month after month, it sat vacant, with Amazon's familiar smile logo plastered on a sign overlooking an empty parking lot.

"I kept thinking it would open, but it didn't," Joe Knowles, Bensalem Township's council president, told CNBC. "All of a sudden, bang, it was ready to go."

Please select this link to read the complete article from CNBC.