With 2 stores opening this month, Lidl nearly done with Best Market takeover on LI

Discount grocer Lidl is nearly finished remodeling and converting the Best Market supermarkets on Long Island it bought in 2019 to break into the local market.

The German grocer will open two local Lidl stores — at 800 Montauk Hwy. in Shirley and at 531 Montauk Hwy. in West Babylon — on Sept. 22 and Sept. 29, respectively, in former Best Market spaces, Lidl said in a statement Thursday.

Those two stores and one in Commack were the last three Best Markets on Long Island that Lidl temporarily closed, in February, for renovations and conversion to the Lidl name. But the Commack store will open in a different space in the same shopping center next year, Lidl announced in July.

The two openings this month will bring the total number of Lidl stores on Long Island to 21. Lidl has said it plans to have 50 stores on Long Island by 2029.

"We’re seeing a lot of enthusiasm for the [Lidl] stores … and the simplicity of shopping. We’re really pleased to open more and provide great options, affordable prices and award-winning products to new communities on Long Island," Lidl spokesman Will Harwood said Thursday.

Lidl entered the Long Island market after it finalized its purchase of 27 stores in New Jersey and New York, including all 24 on Long Island, from Bethpage-based Best Market for a publicly undisclosed price in January 2019.

The supermarket takeover included Lidl permanently closing five Best Market stores — in Great Neck, West Islip, Hicksville, New Hyde Park and Riverhead. In addition, Lidl opened three new stores in spaces that had been vacant — in Plainview, Center Moriches and Riverhead.

The company is spending more than $100 million renovating its Long Island stores in phases, Harwood said.

Lidl, which operates about 11,550 stores in 32 countries, established its U.S. headquarters in Arlington County, Virginia in 2015. After opening its first store in the United States in 2017, it now has more than 150 U.S. stores across nine East Coast states.

The grocer has announced three Long Island store openings planned for 2022:

• Lidl’s first new-construction store on Long Island will open in Deer Park, at 450 Commack Rd., sometime next year.
• A Lidl will open in early 2022 in Garden City Park, in a former Waldbaum’s space at 2475 Jericho Tpke. That store will be considered a replacement for the closed Best Market in New Hyde Park.
• The former Best Market in Commack, which was closed at 84 Jericho Tpke. in the Mayfair Shopping Center, will reopen as a Lidl on the same property, but in a different space, in Stein Mart's former location in early 2022.

By Tory N. Parrish

tory.parrish@newsday.comToryParrish1

Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.