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GOURMET NEWS JANUARY 2016 www.gourmetnews.com Retailer News RETAILER NEWS 1 0 BRIEFS Green Turtle Market Serves up Freshness in the Subtropics way home from work to pick up prepared food that they'll take home with them, cus- tomers who just eat in the restaurant sev- eral times a week, and small business people who use Green Turtle as their regu- lar caterer for staff lunches and business meetings. "Some customers come only for prepared foods. We offer prepared dinners that just need to be warmed up, including items such as Apple and Brie Stuffed Chicken, Key Lime Glazed Shrimp Skewers and Southwest Salmon," Ekinci says. ""Monday through Friday, we see a lot of people just getting off of work and taking advantage of the restaurant-quality meals that they can eat at home." Green Turtle Market offers 48 freshly prepared salads every day; a bakery with fresh breads, cakes and cookies; and farm- to-table produce from growers like Rock- ledge Gardens and Liberty Farms. Ek- inci prefers to buy from produce ven- dors who source from smaller pro- ducers rather than big commercial farms. "I am able to get the greens, the herbs, the vegetables as fresh as possible," he says. "They're re- ally, really good." Grass-fed, antibiotic- and hormone-free beef comes from Deep Roots Farm, which is only an hour away from Green Turtle Market. Two hundred cheeses from around the world wait in two display cases man- aged by a cheesemonger. Ekinci is planning to add substantially to the cheese offering over the next year. This year's addition to a store that's constantly innovating was an espresso bar. "If somebody walks in, they can get a cappuccino or espresso. I am using that in my restaurant also," Ekinci says. "As soon as you walk in, it's like a food heaven." Two master sommeliers curate a selec- tion of 1,100 wines, 50-75 Champagnes and 30 to 40 craft beers, of which 10 to 12 are local. The master sommeliers seek out peak heirloom wines from around the world before they're known to mainstream buyers. Green Turtle also hosts frequent wine dinners in which a five-course meal is served with seven wines to 50 guests at a time."Wine has been a very, very strong cat- egory for the store, one of the leading cate- gories, thanks to our wine superhero Tim Dwight. His extensive knowledge and true passion of wine really makes our market the go-to establishment for fine wines. Dwight's outstanding leadership created a triple digit growth over the years in the wine department," Ekinci says. Local fishermen supply shrimp from Cape Canaveral and locally caught triple- tail, pompano, wahoo and cobia. Green Turtle Market also offers organic Irish salmon, wild-caught sockeye salmon year- round and sushi-grade tuna. Sustainable and traceable seafood is a major draw for his customers, Ekinci says. "I do offer four different shrimp in my seafood case, one from the Keys that's very pink, another one from the Gulf that's very large, almost like a lobster tail... another one from Cape Canaveral. He brings it right from the boat fresh," he says. "People pay attention to that. They come in asking, 'What's the fresh catch?'" The seafood has become so popular that Ekinci has scaled back his meat cases to make room for more seafood: scallops, mussels, clams, oysters from Blue Point to the Gulf, sockeye salmon from Bristol Bay and Copper River and the local stone crabs. "Salmon is one of my biggest markets. It's one of the biggest sales in my fish case," Ekinci says. Customers often come into the market, browse the seafood cases and then wander back to the restaurant, where they'll tell their server to ask Chef to cook whatever looked good to them on their way through the store. Moving 300 pounds of fish a day through his case is helped by the amount of time that Ekinci spends on his sales floor teach- ing his customers how to cook the seafood they buy from him. "I'm talking to people every day. A few years ago, the only place people could get sea bass was in restau- rants. Now I sell a hundred pounds a week in my retail case because I was able to teach customers how to cook the fish," he says. "Many people wanted to learn how to cook the fish. Now they are comfortable. They are used to it, and they're coming back. That's been a game-changer for me, teach- ing my clientele the best way to use it.... They can get results comparable to what they'd get at a restaurant. That's why they're coming back." Another secret to the market's success is the wide range of prepared side dishes that are ready for customers to pick up along with the steak or fish that they plan to grill at home. "I have such a diverse clientele," Ekinci says. "If they come in for a steak, they'll pick up the sides, so that they can go home and have the dinner on the table quickly." GN BY LORRIE BAUMANN In the beach communities of central Florida, the growing season lasts 12 months a year, fish comes fresh off the boats and beef comes from cows that can graze on grass all year long. All of that bounty can be found at the Green Turtle Market, where Executive Chef and Partner Ercan Ekinci offers it up both fresh and al- ready prepared, while Master Sommelier and Partner Tim Dwight stocks wines from around the world. The Green Turtle Market is located in In- dian Harbour Beach, a small town on the barrier island just south of Cape Canaveral, Florida, where Partners Ekinci and Dwight operate it as a 10,000-square-foot gourmet market with a bistro-style restaurant that seats 50, a service deli that seats about 20 and a full-service catering company that caters for events with up to 1,200 guests. The market has 85 employees, including 30 who work in the catering operation, which caters at least 50 weddings a year in addi- tion to corpo- rate events and home enter- taining. Guests at those events often turn up later to shop in the store, Ek- inci says. "People see that the food is beau- tiful, and then they know someone who's getting married or wants to do a party," he says. "It's perfect marketing material to have my beautiful catering truck in the driveway." Ekinci and Dwight founded Green Turtle Market in 2000 after Ekinci graduated from culinary school and decided that offering gourmet to-go meals, fresh salads and bak- ery products would be the best way to use his skills. The partners started looking for a location and found Indian Harbour Beach, where the upscale residents that live in the well-established neighborhoods on the barrier island had no gourmet markets on the island itself. "Beachsiders (as we call the locals) would have to drive to the main- land for at least 30 minutes to a meat mar- ket. It's a common saying here on the island that no ever wants to drive over the bridge because it seems like the bridge gets longer and longer," Ekinci says. The pair started with the market, added the catering service after the first year, then added the Grapevine Cafe and, two years ago, a 2,000-square-foot extension to the store. The market has a broad range of cus- tomers, including the 30- to 50-year-olds who stop in to shop for food to cook for their families, singles who come in on their Vacancies Along New Jersey Retail Corridors Rise in Wake of A&P Bankruptcy With the effects of the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. bankruptcy rippling through the market, the combined vacancy rate along central and northern New Jersey's 10 major retail corridors escalated to 8.3 percent from 7.4 percent a year ago, according to a new survey by R.J. Brunelli & Co., LLC. The Old Bridge-based brokerage's 26th annual survey of the two regions' retail real estate market found a total of 5.18 million square feet of vacancies in the 62.36 million square feet evaluated during the third quarter of 2015. This compared with 4.38 million square feet of empty space in 61.23 million studied in the firm's 2014 survey. Over the last eight years, the combined vacancy rate ranged from a low of 4.2 percent in 2008 to the high of 9.5 percent in 2013. Kroger Reports Sales Growth In its earnings report for the third quarter of 2015, The Kroger Co. reported net earnings of $428 million, or $0.43 per diluted share, and identical supermarket sales growth, without fuel, of 5.4 percent in the third quarter of fiscal 2015. Net earnings in the same period last year were $362 million, or $0.36 per diluted share, including the benefit of certain tax items. Excluding this, Kroger's adjusted net earnings were $345 million, or $0.35 per diluted share, for the third quarter of fiscal 2014. Natural Grocers Reports Strong Financial Results "We are pleased to report another year of strong financial results while continuing our annual unit growth rate of approximately 20 percent. We are encouraged by the acceleration of our comparable store sales trends this past quarter. The key drivers of our strengthening comparable store sales include our focused sales initiatives, outstanding customer service and continued operational excellence," said Kemper Isely, Co-President. "As we move into fiscal 2016, we expect to open 23 new stores, resulting in a unit growth of 22.3 percent, and to relocate four existing stores. We believe we have a strong foundation of staffing and systems to support our disciplined growth." Grocery Outlet Bargain Market Launches Operator Recruitment Website Grocery Outlet Bargain Market has launched an independent operator recruitment website that provides information about the brand, store leadership, and how easy it is to create your own business as an independent operator. This unique business opportunity enables aspiring entrepreneurs, skilled grocery, retail, and food service veterans to operate a Grocery Outlet Bargain Market independently under a license from the parent company.