Rouses to open 1st Biloxi store

Rouses Markets plans to open its first store in Biloxi, Mississippi, the grocer announced.

The 60,000-square-foot location, previously home to a Winn-Dixie store, will undergo a full remodel, CEO Donny Rouse said in a statement late last week. Construction is expected to start in April, with an opening slated for spring 2024.

“I know Biloxi will be very excited about what we do with the space,” Rouse said. “It will be very different from the old grocery provider that was in that spot, not only in how it looks, but in the products and services offered.”

The new store, Rouse said, will focus on “everything local,” including seafood, produce and extensive lines of Gulf Coast-made products.

“We will have our own Sausage Kitchen, smokehouse, bakery, florist and seafood boiling room in the store, and everything you could want to eat,” he said.

Biloxi’s Mayor Andrew “FoFo” Gilich called the project “a perfect example of a public-private partnership.”

The new store will employ about 200 people. It will be Louisiana-based Rouses’ fifth store in Mississippi. Rouses, which was founded in 1960, operates 63 stores in three states on the Gulf Coast.

In November, Rouses announced it had purchased a shopping center in Picayune, Mississippi, with plans to build a new supermarket there in 2024.

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Rouses currently has three stores under construction, in Houma, Baton Rouge and Lafayette, Louisiana. It’s expected that Houma will be the first of the batch to open, likely this summer, Charles Merrell, Rouses’ VP of corporate development, told WGB last year.

“Picayune’s a great site,” Merrell said, adding that the area has lacked a grocery store since one retailer left the area in 2017. “We’re excited to go to Picayune. We believe it’s an underserved community. Over the years, we’ve had a large amount of calls to bring a store there.”