Jul 29, 2009

Without an anchor, small businesses get movingBy Maria PanaritisPhilly.com

They include a 63-year-old barber, an optician, an immigrant-turned-pizza-shop owner, and a couple of small businessmen who opened stores after layoffs by downsizing employers.

They are tenants at the Collegeville Shopping Center – mostly local folks running mom-and-pop shops – and they are enmeshed in a recession-era web of misfortune brought on by the loss of their big anchor supermarket a few months back.

Theirs are not the only small businesses suffering as anchor stores vanish in a weak economy. But these merchants stand out because, with borough officials taking the lead, they have mounted a campaign to influence the large corporations that hold the future of this suburban shopping center – and its tenants’ livelihoods – in their hands.

During the last month, the merchants have gathered 570 signatures on a petition urging Acme Markets to consider allowing another supermarket chain – one of its biggest competitors, Shop Rite – to take over the remaining four years of its lease.

Acme, owned by Minnesota-based Supervalu Inc., said it was actively marketing the property it vacated in February and would consider even the Shop Rite offer, which was submitted a week ago in writing.

The company denied claims in the petition that Acme wanted to block a competing supermarket from taking over the property to protect sales at its other stores.

“From a commonsense perspective, that’s definitely something we need to be concerned about, having our business affected at Limerick,” said Acme spokeswoman Taryne Williams. The company was concerned, she said, about making sure business at its Limerick location was strong enough to keep its workers there employed.

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