Uncle Giuseppe's expansion to include new supermarket in Bohemia

Uncle Giuseppe’s Marketplace's growth push into new communities will include a new store in Bohemia.

The high-end Italian specialty grocer will open a 39,000-square-foot store in Sayville Plaza in late 2025, said Carl DelPrete, chief executive officer of the Melville-based chain of 11 stores in New York and New Jersey.

"We think it’s going to be a great location for Uncle Giuseppe’s. … We think that the market is underserved by supermarkets actually,” he said.

Uncle Giuseppe’s Bohemia store will be located at 5181 Sunrise Hwy. in a former Babies R Us space.

Sayville Plaza is split between two owners. The shopping center already has a grocery tenant, discounter Aldi, which opened in 2022 in the portion of the property owned by Illinois-based Transformco, the parent company of Sears and Kmart.

Uncle Giuseppe’s will be in the portion of the property owned by an affiliate of Breslin Realty Development Corp., a Garden City-based real estate firm.

Another specialty grocer, Whole Foods Market, which focuses on organic and natural products, will be opening in 2026 in Holbrook. The store will be in a redevelopment of The Shops at SunVet, formerly Sun Vet Mall, which is about 2.4 miles away from Sayville Plaza.

DelPrete is not concerned about grocery competition in the area, he said.

“No, Uncle Giuseppe’s is a unique and different shopping experience,” he said. “Every one of our stores prepares in-house all of its items, made fresh, sold fresh.”

From a landlord’s standpoint, a grocery store is a good tenant to have because it draws foot traffic regularly, and Uncle Giuseppe’s has a strong local following, said Robert Delavale, vice president and director of leasing at Breslin Realty.

“They’ve built a very good reputation on Long Island,” he said.

A family-owned chain, Uncle Giuseppe’s opened its first store in East Meadow in 1998.

The grocer has been pushing faster expansion recently, having opened four stores in the last five years: in Yorktown Heights, Westchester County, in 2019; North Babylon in 2020; Morris Plains, New Jersey, in 2021; and Tinton Falls, New Jersey, in 2023.

In July, Uncle Giuseppe’s announced that in 2026, the grocer would move into an approximately 52,000-square-foot space in Greenvale, at 130 Wheatley Plaza, which grocer Stop & Shop vacated in October.

Uncle Giuseppe’s plans to open one or two new stores annually to reach 20 supermarkets by 2029, and the grocer is looking at spaces in Connecticut and Pennsylvania, DelPrete said.

'A real powerhouse location'

For years, Sayville Plaza was plagued by vacancies caused by national retailers’ bankruptcies and other financial woes after the exits of Babies R Us, OfficeMax, Borders Books & Music and Sports Authority.

Sayville Plaza now is almost fully leased after the sale of the middle piece of the property to Transformco and the addition of large chain stores since 2021, such as Aldi, Floor & Decor and home goods store At Home.

Boot Barn opened in April, and Harbor Freight and F45 Training opened in 2022.

Next year, Bob’s Discount Furniture will take 19,000 square feet of the space vacated by Bed Bath & Beyond in 2023, Delavale said.

"We believe that with the addition of Uncle Giuseppe's, this [shopping center] is going to be a real powerhouse location," he said.

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.