ShopRite to open in A&P locations in Bethpage, Deer Park

Two new ShopRite supermarkets are opening this week in renovated locations formerly owned by bankrupt Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co.

One ShopRite opened in Bethpage Tuesday morning at 3901 Hempstead Tpke. in a former Pathmark.

Another, in Deer Park, is to open Thursday at 1960 Deer Park Ave. in a former Waldbaum’s.

ShopRite is a cooperative, run by Wakefern Food Corp. of Keasbey, New Jersey. It has more than 250 ShopRites in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Delaware and Maryland as well as New York.

The Bethpage store is owned by father and son Jon and Seth Greenfield and their company Food Parade Inc., of Plainvew, a family-owned business made up of second- and third-generation grocers.

The Greenfield family also owns two ShopRite stores in Plainview and another in Commack. The family plans to open another ShopRite this spring in a former Pathmark in New Hyde Park.

The Bethpage store employs almost 300 full- and part-time workers.

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The Deer Park store also is owned by a father-and-son team, Kenneth Thompson Sr. and Kenneth Thompson Jr. of K. Thompson Foods II LLC of Bohemia. It will include a full-service pizzeria, Grandma Rose’s Pizza, a dine-in cafe and an expanded section of imported Italian specialties, according to Wakefern.

It will employ 280.

Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. headquartered in Montvale, New Jersey, filed in July for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and reorganization.

All 51 Waldbaum’s and Pathmark stores operated by A&P on Long Island closed by November. Thirty were purchased by supermarket chains, 20 were turned over to their landlords and one was sold to a real estate company.

While the new operators hired more than 1,500 employees from closed Waldbaum’s and Pathmark stores, union officials have estimated that more than 2,000 jobs were eliminated on the Island.

The Labor Department data show the grocery sector lost 2,300 jobs last year from the year before.

In total, A&P operated 296 stores under banners such as A&P, Food Emporium, Super Fresh and Food Basics; its 51 local stores included 32 Waldbaum’s and 19 Pathmarks.

In October, a bankruptcy court judge approved bids from Wakefern to buy the leases of the Waldbaum’s store in Deer Park and the two Pathmark stores in Bethpage and New Hyde Park as part of a $40 million purchase package of 12 former A&P stores.