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With a nod to Throwback Thursday, SN commemorates Wegmans Food Markets’ 100th anniversary with this pictorial history of the Rochester, N.Y.-based, family-owned chain.
Brothers Walter and John Wegman began their grocery business back in 1916 as horse-and-cart-driven Rochester Fruit & Vegetable Company.
Related story: Wegmans kicks off 100-year celebration
The nascent company had traded in its carts for trucks by 1920.
Wegmans opened what in 1930 was a “gigantic” 20,000-square-foot prototype on Main Street in Rochester.
By the 1930s, the stores had taken on a modern look with center aisles stacked with shelf-stable items.
Produce already played an important role in Wegmans’ playbook in 1930. Even in black and white, this is one vibrant display.
One of the “eye-popping” innovations of the Main Street store was its cafeteria, which seated 300, and Wegmans has placed a premium on foodservice ever since.
Walter Wegman (left), shown in an early 20th century portrait, and his son Robert, in 1937 when he graduated from Aquinas Institute and joined the family business full-time. Robert would become president of Wegmans in 1950.
The Bullshead store in 1937. The grocery chain in the ’30s introduced refrigerated display windows and vaporized water sprays for produce.
This store was Wegmans’ first in the suburbs, opening in 1941 at a shopping center on Monroe Avenue near Rochester. Signage shows the company was already touting its “home owned” advantage.
The checkout lanes bustle with shoppers, clerks and baggers at the Fairport Wegmans in 1958. The ’50s saw many new firsts for Wegmans, including “electric eye” conveyor belts, registers that calculate change and “magic carpet” self-opening doors.
The parking lot filled up fast in 1960 at the Wegmans in the Rochester suburb of Ironequoit. The ’60s saw additional advances such as an air curtain entrance to reduce cold drafts and a major egg-producing enterprise. Danny Wegman joined the company in 1964, and his dad Robert became chairman in 1969.
Sleek lines and spotless fixtures merge with a bumper food supply at Wegmans in 1960.
The 26,000-square-foot Ridgemont store — the “largest and most elaborate supermarket for miles around” — in 1970 boasted a deli and large gourmet section with a rather eclectic selection of preserved octopus, hearts of palm and candied cauliflower.
Robert Wegman was there in 1974 to introduce East Rochester customers to laser scanners that read product UPCs — bar codes. The scanners were the first in the state and the third on the continent.
Wegman family members continue their company leadership to this day: SVP Nicole Wegman, CEO Danny Wegman and president Colleen Wegman. Danny is the father of Colleen and Nicole, and the son of long-time chairman Robert Wegman.
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