Downtown Buffalo Project Gets Fresh Food Anchor

A new project coming to downtown Buffalo, N.Y., will provide a high-profile new location for a farmer’s market store.

City officials and local developers this week said Braymiller Market would be the retail anchor for a new 201-unit apartment complex to be built on a block of Ellicott Street in Buffalo. The project was initially envisioned to have included an outpost of Tops Markets’ Orchard Fresh concept, but as the scope of the project changed—including a smaller footprint for the anchor store and fewer high-end apartments than initially envisioned—Braymiller was seen as a more appropriate candidate, local reports said. The new store will be about 20,000 square feet and is expected to open in 2021.

The project, known as 201 Ellicott, will offer 201 affordable one- and two-bedroom apartments, according to developer Ciminelli Real Estate Corp.

Braymiller Market is a one-store operator based in Hamburg, N.Y., known for fresh foods, deli and catering, and as a restaurant fresh food supplier.

“Every community that is economically and financially sustainable has choices—choices in housing, choices in grocery stores, choices of good jobs,” Buffalo Mayor Byron W. Brown said in a statement. “The addition of Braymiller Market, bringing fresh produce and specialty foods to our urban shoppers, is one more positive piece in our continued efforts to build an even more equitable, sustainable and financial platform for Buffalo.”

Braymiller Market owner Stuart Green (third from right) and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown (second from right) at an event announcing the 201 Ellicott project in downtown Buffalo.

Photograph courtesy of the City of Buffalo

“Our formula for success, our ‘secret sauce,’ is retail and wholesale offerings of the freshest foods,” added Stuart Green, owner of Braymiller Market. “We offer our customers core grocery items to accompany our vast variety of produce that we source seasonally from local farms. In addition, we prepare our own soups, salads, meals and sandwiches here in our market with those perishable products.”

A Tops spokeswoman told local media that the company understood the decision to go in a different direction and that it was looking forward to working with the city of Buffalo on future projects.

Tops separately said this week that it was investing $2 million in a major remodel of its Thruway Plaza store in Cheektowaga, N.Y., and that it would close an older unit 2 miles away.

Expected to be completed in July, the Cheektowaga remodel entails an expansion of the store’s produce, bakery, deli and carryout cafe areas, which will now include seating.

Shoppers will also find a wide selection of natural and organic offerings, as well as meal solutions, to choose from. New flooring, enhanced LED lighting, cart corrals, shopping carts and new interior decor will give the store a refreshed and vibrant appearance, the company said. 

The closing store is Tops’ oldest in Erie County. Its workers will be offered jobs in other Tops sites.

Williamsville, N.Y.-based Tops operates 159 stores, with five additional units operated by franchisees under the Tops Markets banner.