GIANT | Springfield, PA

 

950 Baltimore Pike

Welcome to the Springfield Square GIANT!

Thanks again for stopping by The Retail Connection! In this post, we'll be taking a full tour of this GIANT store in Springfield. The store opened on July 15, 2012 in a former Genuardi's, which opened in 1996 with the shopping center. It's been freshly remodeled with GIANT's new backlit signage décor. Let's head inside and take a look.

I went through the secondary entrance, which leads to the beer and wine department. The main entrance goes into produce.

Beer and wine is in a pretty good-sized alcove in the front corner. Also in this area are the salad bar and a small seating area.

Past that section is the deli and fresh kitchen, which sells pizza and other prepared foods. Personally, I'm a fan of this décor, for its cleanliness and simplicity. I know some people don't like it, though. It's certainly a departure from the crazier interiors GIANT had in the 90's and 2000's (I just love this retro Bake Shop sign).

Speaking of bake shops, our next stop on this tour is the in-store service bakery. I very rarely, if ever, shop at GIANT, so I can't speak to how good their baked goods taste. But I can certainly say that they know how to bake things that smell delicious. I'll have to try something from a GIANT bakery sometime.

Frozen foods are next, and line the far left wall past the deli counter.

Along the back are packaged meats. No huge backlit signs on the walls here. Dairy is in the aisles across from here.

Looking down aisle 5, the bakeware aisle. While I like these aisle markers, they really clash with the rest of the décor. The font, especially, feels more like late 2000's than early 2020's. 

Customer service and a deplorable floral department are on the front wall, past that aisle. If you look closely, you can see a little message about how GIANT started in 1923 as a small meat market, which I think is a cool touch.

Heading back to meat and seafood, or LAND & SEA, which takes up most of the back wall.

The produce section (or GARDEN) is on the right side of the store. Normally, the produce department is the first thing you see when entering a supermarket, but since I went through the other entrance it wound up being one of the last.

And a wider view, which also shows the in-store GIANT Direct section. They package pick-up and delivery grocery orders in there.

Plant-based and natural foods are in the vicinity, in the back right corner. Of the three main grocers in the Delaware Valley, I think GIANT has the best health foods selection. The prices seem to be pretty good, too; for health foods, anyway.

Cash registers and the "thank you" sign are, as always, along the front. There's another GIANT on the other side of Springfield, closer to Broomall (which has its own store). That location opened in 2011 and is a purpose-built store located on the site of an old Value City Department Store.

Other Images of Interest

The days of family pride...

As I mentioned in the introduction to this post, this GIANT was originally a Genuardi's, one of 15 acquired by the former company in the summer of 2012. Thanks to a November 2011 article from the local Patch newsletter, we can see what this store looked like as a Genuardi's. As you'll see, GIANT has made virtually zero exterior changes.

The "Food Court" sign stayed on the exterior until GIANT's recent renovation of the store. I'm not sure if the Starbucks lasted until GIANT took over, but I do know it was gone before the food court as a whole was.

Street View Images

2022

It isn't as noticeable in my sunnier shot, but here you can really see the lighter paint color they used when they changed out the logo.

2017

Still using the older logo and Genuardi's-era pharmacy sign here. I'm not sure when the pharmacy was taken out.

2012

And, as of June 2012, ingredients for life were still being sold in this building. I miss Genuardi's. Even though they were owned by Safeway in the later years, you could still feel a family touch.

That's going to do it here on The Retail Connection! I seldom shop at GIANT, but only because there aren't any that are close enough to me. Their stores are always nicely kept and have a good selection. Acme and ShopRite aren't expanding the way GIANT is right now, so I wouldn't be surprised to see them creep up in the rankings over the next few years and open new stores. Anyway, thanks for shopping with us! The Retail Connection: For today's table.