grocery wars

Fairway Will Sell 5 Stores and File for Bankruptcy Protection

Photo: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The reports are (kind of) true. After rumors swirled yesterday that Fairway will go out of business, the grocery chain announced today that it has filed for voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, so that it can complete a $70 million sale to Village Supermarket, Inc., a company that currently operates ShopRite and Gourmet Garage. If the sale goes through, it will include Fairway’s distribution center and five Fairway locations. Those include — as New York 1 reports — the Upper West Side flagship, as well as the Upper East Side, Chelsea, Harlem, and Kips Bay stores. (The fate of Fairway’s other nine locations remains up in the air, and New York 1 additionally reports that the grocer will talk with other companies about those stores.)

It’s not quite the doom that New Yorkers were greeted with yesterday, when the New York Post reported that Fairway was filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and planning to close all of its stores, but it’s also not the bright, cheery situation that Fairway offered in its extremely carefully worded rebuttal of that report.

In a press release, Village CEO Robert Sumas says that the company is “committed to keeping Fairway, including its name, unique product selection and value, a part of this community.”

Fairway to Sell 5 Stores and File for Bankruptcy Protection