BRIAR PATCH
FOOD CO-OP
Grass Valley, California
In moving from a 3,000-sf store with no prepared foods into a new 20,000-sf store with a deli the size of their old store, our design for BriarPatch's first prepared foods operation was decidedly ambitious. But former general manager Paul Harton's vision for a great prepared foods operation being the magnet to attract new customers was perfectly prescient.
And, under current general manager Chris Maher's leadership of that opening deli, their team quickly hit the mark -- exceeding their first-year sales projections in 3 months. And, we quickly went to work to develop an auxiliary kitchen and storage facility in an adjacent space. (Today it's where they crank out volumes of delicious all-organic bakery, dessert and pizza products.)
BriarPatch's wildly successful prepared foods operation consistently commands more than 20% of store sales and was mentioned in their being nationally honored with the 2018 "Cooperative Excellence - Retailer of the Year" award.
Now, with a decade and a half of collaborative experience, we're bringing everything we've learned and a vision for the future to our design of a new 4,000-sf prepared foods operation in their new Auburn, California store, scheduled to open in Oct. 2022.