The only Piggly Wiggly Supermarket in Broward County will go out of business today or Wednesday after four years of operation in Wilton Manors, store officials said.
The 24-hour supermarket at 2270 Wilton Drive is closing because it was unable to make enough money, officials of Malone & Hyde Inc. said. The Memphis, Tenn., wholesale food distributor recently assumed ownership of the 45,000- square-foot store.
“It didn’t generate any positive funds,” said Dick Stewart, a spokesman in Malone & Hyde’s office in Miami.
Most of the supermarket’s shelves were bare on Monday, and there were few customers. With all store merchandise marked down 50 percent, sales during the weekend were brisk.
The supermarket opened four years ago today, It replaced a Grand Union grocery store, which had operated there for more than 20 years.
Piggly Wiggly Corp., also based in Memphis, has sold more than 1,000 franchises to independent owners around the nation. There are several Piggly Wiggly supermarkets in Florida, but many in Central Florida had financial troubles in 1987.
There are two Piggly Wiggly supermarkets in Miami. There are none in Palm Beach County.
Customers shopping at the Wilton Manors store on Monday said they were sorry to see it close.
But Mark Maxwell, who manages the Shoppes of Wilton Manors, the plaza where the supermarket is located, was not one of them.
“They’ve not been an asset to the center,” Maxwell said. “We don’t feel very badly about losing them.”
Maxwell said the store was never able to compete with nearby Publix or Winn- Dixie supermarkets because its prices were higher.
Grand Union earned about $15 million annually, he said. But Piggly Wiggly was never able to generate that same level of profit.
The supermarket was the anchor store for the small shopping center of about a dozen businesses. The plaza is owned by Southeast Bank, and Maxwell is the bank’s trustee.
He said Piggly Wiggly declined to renew its lease on the building in December. The lease expires in May.
Future plans for the site are unclear.
“We may knock the building down and start from scratch,” Maxwell said. “I guess it lends itself to many things. We’ve made no decision other than the space is available and we will remodel or divide the property.”
Two stores adjacent to Piggly Wiggly recently relocated. The owners of Posey Patch Florist and McGilligan’s Card & Gift shop said they relocated because of the supermarket’s decision to close.
“That’s a loss of a significant amount of foot traffic, and that’s what my business depends on,” said Bill Kind, the owner of McGilligan’s.
