Fresh and value-added seafood is a focal point at a new epicurean-minded supermarket concept just launched by Midwestern retailer Schnucks Market.
St. Louis-based Schnucks — which operates 106 stores in Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Tennessee, Mississippi and Missouri — last week opened its first Culinaria — A Schnucks Market store in downtown St. Louis.
The 21,000-square-feet store is a new urban format about one-third the size of a typical Schnucks store. Still, it stocks around 22,000 different products and emphasizes food prepared in its stores daily, along with its fresh seafood offerings.
“Culinaria’s service meat and seafood, hot and cold food bars, made-to-order sandwiches, salad, pizza …. and made-from-scratch side dishes make it possible for customers to do their complete grocery shopping at Culinaria,” said store manager Tom Collora.
Culinaria features sushi and specialty seafood items prepared in-house, such as Parmesan Panko Tilapia, Bourbon Pecan Salmon and Salmon Burgers, which come in Italian and Garden Vegetable flavors.
Culinaria executives also tout the freshness of the store’s seafood and their knowledgeable staff.
“Culinaria’s seafood experts inspect each product for quality and freshness. They can tell you anything you want to know about your fish — where it comes from, even what school it attended,” said a statement on store’s Web site.
Culinaria buyers work directly with fishing boats and farms “to bring you daily deliveries of fresh fish from around the world,” according to the company. Among the species Culinaria carries are halibut, mahimahi, crawfish, smoked salmon, Gulf shrimp, Alaska king crab and yellowfin tuna.
