I am a big believer in shopping at local grocery stores for food while traveling. There is no need to eat out every meal, especially for breakfast. I mean this both in terms of the quantity/quality of the food and the price point. Not only that, but going to the grocery store (even at home) is really one of my favorite things to do! So, during our recent trip to Utah, I did just that! Below, I am essentially sharing a review of the four different “grocery stores” I visited. Keep in mind that this is just one location on one day that I visited. It could be better or worse on a day you decide to visit!
Table of Contents
Sol Foods
This was the “local grocer” in Springdale, UT, which is the town where we stayed for the week, and is the town where Zion is located. This was the easy grocery store to visit because it was right in the middle of everything.
With that said, it was also wickedly expensive and the quality of produce was just alright (see the tomato example below). Everything, from the water to the citrus, was over twice the price of what I would currently pay at my local Walmart. There was also only fresh-cut pineapple and watermelon options.
I would only shop here if I did not have another option, which after our first day of an excruciating hike, there was no way I was going to get in the car to go search for another grocery store in a different town!
Davis Farmers Market
The name of this grocery store reminded me of the good old days I spent in Davis! I was also pleasantly surprised by this store.
The first time I visited, I walked in to see this display. It is offering bags that you can fill up for $11. So, every produce item in the bins that you can fit in the bag would be a total of $11.
At first, I thought it was an interesting marketing approach. But, at a closer look, it made me think of a few things:
- This is a good way to get people more excited about produce
- This is a good way for the store to make some extra money (2 pineapples would cost $4 currently at Walmart or the larger ones for $6 at Costco, but you could fit two in a bag here for $11!)
- It all depends on how much the consumer (1) pays attention to price and (2) understands where the different produce items fall price-wise
Some other interesting finds included:
- Really inexpensive asparagus being sold at the front entrance
- A hose instead of misters (I know this is common in some areas, but I have only seen this once in a really small grocery store in California)
- A large refrigerated section, but no fresh cut fruit?!?!?!
- However, nothing was as questionable as the gallon of milk that happened to catch my eye! Would you be comfortable buying that?
All in all, this was a good grocery store. The prices were good, the quality of produce was good, and they had what I was looking for!
Clark’s Country Market
This market was advertised as a Grocery Store, so I am including it here. But, please note that it was located in a shopping area with a gas station and a restaurant in a really small town. We stumbled upon this store when we traveled to visit Bryce Canyon (this was about ten minutes away).
My first glance is always at the produce department. This produce section was very small and limited. There was no refrigeration, but there was ice beneath a few products.
I saw this astro turf display (below), which I still see frequently at farmer’s markets, and would like to remind you that this is not good for fruit quality and cannot be washed!
(If you are looking for what to look for while shopping at your local farmer’s market, you can read my post on that HERE.)
I only bought bananas here and they were $0.89/pound, which is comparable to some of the larger grocers near me. This grocery store, however, reminded me of how lucky I am to have so many different grocery store options around me in California with an abundance of fresh produce.
Lin’s Fresh Market
This is a small grocery chain and the store we actually visited was in a small town called Overton, right outside of the Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada on our way home. However, they do have stores in Utah as well.
We stopped there to see if we could pick up some food for lunch, so I was actually drawn to their meat that was fresh off the barbeque and these huge deli sandwiches that they were selling for only $5. I was really excited about this store!
From the outset, the produce department looked like it was going to be good, but it turns out, it was not! Here is just a snippet of what I found: wilted vegetables and poor sanitation practices. If these are the issues you can see, imagine what we cannot see!
I was, however, impressed with their fresh-cut vegetable selection. On the bottom right in the picture below, that is a huge container of salad for only $10.
Based on the deli portion of this store, I would not rule out a return. However, I would probably like to visit another one of the chain’s grocery stores in hopes that they have better sanitation practices.
All of these grocery trips were really exciting for me. It is always good to see how things operate in other parts of the world, and in this case, it made me even more appreciative of the great abundance of produce we have available to us. It also made me even more convinced that there is a desperate need for greater sanitation regulations at the grocery store level. Growers/packers/processors have so many regulations set in place (a lot of which are from the larger grocery stores), but now it is time for the grocery stores to jump on board too!
If you enjoyed this post, you might also be interested in reading:
What A GREAT SPECTRUM of venues & offerings Megan shares with us!!
GREAT job, Megan!! Thank you for sharing!!
Eric Sorensen
very interesting…I’m going to start looking closer at the sanitation in the stores I shop in (Ontario, Canada)
Megan,
I too love to shop grocery stores in different towns. I am not a fan of Walmart but they do have good prices and decent produce. I was very impressed with Hi-Vee in Lees Summit, Mo. Prices Ok but awesome produce. Finally , my home store Krogers- Forest Hills , Ohio. This is a Cincinnati suburb and has recently been remodeled. Their produce is awesome and it is a focus of the store. It helps that some top executives shop here so they are always” on their game” Thanks for your post. I too are looking for clean, sanitary stores and are turned off when a place is dirty or produce is not presented properly.
I am so glad I’m not the only person who does this when traveling! If you ever end up in Seattle, give a shout out and I can provide the local grocery stores here to try… And year round fruit markets and farmers markets!
The milk is so laughable. I also think the $11 bags is interesting, would be curious to see how the grocery stores wins/loses on that one.