The first tenant in a new shopping center on the site of the former Mountain View Elementary School will be the first location in Georgia for the Publix GreenWise Market concept.
The Atlanta Business Chronicle reported that the store will have 25,000 square feet as the anchor of a 103,000-square foot development on 14 acres on Sandy Plains Road at Shallowford Road.
The still-to-be-named complex is being developed by East Cobb-based Brooks Chadwick Capital and Fuqua Development and will include “chef-driven” restaurants, retail and service shops and a self-storage facility.
Rezoning for the complex was approved by Cobb commissioners last fall, and they signed off on the self-storage building this spring despite complaints from nearby residents.
According to a report in ToNeTo Atlanta, which covers the metro retailing scene, Publix is rolling out its GreenWise Market organic foods concept in other Southern markets. They include Tallahassee, Boca Raton and the Charleston, S.C. area.
The East Cobb store will be right down the street from a Publix supermarket at the Highland Plaza Shopping Center. The ABC quoted an Atlanta real estate observer that:
“The target market for GreenWise is those areas that have a strong Publix presence already. GreenWise could function as a complementary destination for a core Publix location, helping to spread out customer density in their busiest markets.”
GreenWise is eyeing a competitive East Cobb organic grocery market, with Whole Foods and Sprouts nearby, in the Johnson Ferry-Roswell area.
The Shallowford-Sandy Plains area also was a target of Lidl, a German-based supermarket chain, which wanted to locate a store on the site of the Park 12 Cobb movie theater on Gordy Parkway. But its zoning application was rejected by commissioners last fall following intense community opposition.
ToNeTo said the East Cobb Public GreenWise Market could open by next summer.
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