ShopRite

March 8, 2020

We’re All About Food.
We’re All About Savings.
We’re All About You.

ShopRite’s 321 U.S. Store Locations

From the small “Mom and Pop” shops of the 1940s, to a successful chain of retail grocery stores, all ShopRite stores are still family-owned and operated. In fact, many of the stores are owned and operated by second, third, or even fourth generations.

Based in Keasbey, New Jersey, ShopRite consists of 321 grocery stores, under the corporate name Wakefern Food Corporation. As the largest retailer-owned cooperative in the United States and the largest employer in New Jersey, ShopRite’s 50 members individually own and operate supermarkets under the ShopRite banner. All ShopRite owners are members of Wakefern Food Corp.

ShopRite store on Springfield Ave, Newark, NJ 

Today, Wakefern and ShopRite together employ more than 50,000 people throughout New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland.

The cooperative buys in volume, enabling store-owners to offer customers low prices and great value.

How it all started…
In 1946, a Del Monte Foods sales representative talked to several independent grocers in Newark, New Jersey. The grocers were having trouble getting reasonable prices for wholesale products. The Del Monte representative suggested the grocers try cooperative buying. Seven of them agreed, paid $1,000 each, and Wakefern Foods was launched. On December 5, 1946, Wakefern Foods was incorporated and the name ShopRite was created.

By 1961, Wakefern had 70 members,
totaling $100 million in annual sales.

Wakefern’s transportation fleet consists of 400 tractors and 2,000 trailers that travel more than 35 million miles annually delivering food and non-food products to the warehouses for ShopRite stores. They operate over 2.5 million square feet of warehousing.

Helping the community…
ShopRite owners care about the people in their communities. They support the Community Food Bank of New Jersey by donating food, services, money and hundreds of volunteer hours each year.

Supermarket Careers…
Supermarket Careers, an innovative and award-winning program that began in 1989, trains special needs students for entry-level supermarket and retail positions. 

By working in the school store, students train for jobs in all retail departments, including cashier, produce, deli, bakery, courtesy and grocery. ShopRite currently employs former graduates of the program in many of its local stores.

ShopRite also sponsors the annual New Jersey Special Olympics, which attracts more than 1,800 athletes and 20,000 attendees.

ShopRite today…
Today, ShopRite stores can be found in the northeast from the Washington metropolitan area in Maryland to the Hartford area in Connecticut and as far north as New York’s Capital District. In 2011–2013, ShopRite returned to the New York Capital District after exiting the market 23 years earlier.

Gloria Sauvé
Communications and Marketing

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