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CARLISLE, Pa. — Giant Food Stores expects to launch an e-commerce hub later this year in Lancaster, Pa., that will bolster the grocer’s delivery business while serving as a pickup destination for shoppers who purchase merchandise from the company’s website.
The 38,000-square-foot facility will be the fifth such hub in Pennsylvania and will permit Giant Food and its online grocery partner Peapod to significantly increase the number of online shoppers they serve.
“We’re seeing double-digit growth in online ordering and grocery delivery,” said Giant Food president Nicholas Bertram. “We are rededicating ourselves to the Lancaster market, and we want this cutting‐edge facility to be unique — something the Northeast neighborhood will be proud of while we meet this demand. We’re excited because the e‐commerce hub will allow us to increase capacity quickly.
“Grocery shopping is changing, and the pace is accelerating. Our e-commerce hub will drive growth while helping our customers to shop how they want, when they want and, most important, where they want.”
The e-commerce hub is part of a $22 million investment in the Lancaster area that includes remodels of four stores, lower prices and the opening of a new fuel station. Three of the remodeled stores are in Lancaster and one is in Lititz, Pa., which is home to the new fuel station.
Giant said the store upgrades will make shopping and saving easier, and reflect the grocer’s focus on fresh, quality products sold at affordable prices and delivered with caring, friendly service each time a customer shops.
The upgrades have allowed Giant to expand the stores’ product selection, with a wider offering of fresh produce, meat and seafood, including a new meat and seafood destination case.
Expert associates staffing the service counter can answer customers’ questions as well as give cooking recommendations on the beef, chicken, pork, lamb, veal, shrimp, fish and specialty items that are on display in the case.
In two of the remodeled stores, customers will find an expanded deli department serving busy shoppers with hot food and cheese offerings, the company said. Giant now has a wider variety of grab‐and‐go items and presliced deli meats and cheeses, which are sliced fresh daily. “Easy and affordable” hot meals with sides are available seven days a week.
Enhancements at one of the remodeled stores in Lancaster include a new cheese shop, a “chef prepared” case with ready-to-eat meals, an Asian hot bar and a produce juicing station.
Each of the updated stores features a new look in the health and beauty care departments, with expanded product offerings that are easy to find due to newly installed LED lighting, Giant said.
The company also announced last month that it had opened its 65th Beer & Wine Eatery in Pennsylvania, at the Giant supermarket in Camp Hill.
Giant thus became the first vendor to sell alcoholic beverages after voters last year approved a referendum in favor of granting liquor licenses to grocery stores and restaurants in the Cumberland County municipality. The Camp Hill Giant on June 29 began selling hundreds of domestic, imported and craft beers and offering an “immense” selection of wines.
