Almost from the day Trader Joe’s opened in 2013 in the Boulevard Shopping Center along Niagara Falls Boulevard, people have been pushing the supermarket chain to bring a second store to the area.
Now, it has finally happened.
Pending final approvals from the Town of Clarence, Benderson Development will be demolishing a recently closed Applebee’s at 5107 Transit Road - an outparcel to the Eastgate Plaza - and replacing it with a 13,500-square-foot Trader Joe’s.
It in essence bookends the retailing lucrative Amherst-Clarence/Northern Erie County corridor by having both an east and west location.
So why Clarence over the push for a second Trader Joe’s in Orchard Park?
The Clarence/Amherst axis along Transit Road makes more sense, says Michael Clark, retail real estate specialist with CBRE Upstate New York.
"They’re obviously doing very well over on the Boulevard. The next logical step for them would be where they're going out on Transit Road, where you still have what I assume is their customer demographic which is a higher-end middle-income customer in the next largest density in Western New York. So, look at their most bang for their buck there,” Clark said.
Consider this, the Eastgate Plaza site has 154,470 people living within five miles of the store and has an average household income of $127,071 —very lofty numbers for this region. It has 37,000 vehicles pass by the store site on a daily basis.
The Orchard Park site - located in the heart of. The village - has 90,530 people living within five miles of the area and an average household income of $88,292. The main drag of Orchard Park’s village business district sees an average of 14,206 vehicles per day.
Those were among the factors why Trader Joe’s opted for the Clarence site.
“We have a value-driven consumer here. They definitely drive that home, and they deliver pretty high-quality stuff. If they didn't, they wouldn't survive here,” Clark.
Benderson needs Clarence's planning board and town board approval this winter before starting construction on the Trader Joe’s site this spring and a projected late 2025 opening.
