Liz Abunaw claims Chicago's black south and west side residents don't have access to groceries. She has received nearly $3M in grants and taxpayer subsidies to open a "black-owned" store in Austin. | Forty Acres Grocery Store
Liz Abunaw claims Chicago's black south and west side residents don't have access to groceries. She has received nearly $3M in grants and taxpayer subsidies to open a "black-owned" store in Austin. | Forty Acres Grocery Store
Activists describe Chicago's South Side as a "food desert," where grocery chains allegedly refuse to operate.
But there are currently 89 grocery stores currently serving south side neighborhoods, 43 of which are operated global giants Wal-Mart, Aldi, Target and Jewel-Osco, according to an analysis by Chicago City Wire.
That's approximately a store for every 8,400 South Side residents, using the official City of Chicago community designations and the U.S. Census population estimate of 752,500.
The Chicago City Wire Analysis included stores in South Side "edge" suburbs directly adjacent to City of Chicago neighborhoods, including Evergreen Park, Alsip, Merionette Park and Oak Lawn. It also considers Mexican chains like Supermercados El Guero, often ignored in similar analyses.
The largest grocery chains in the U.S. serve Chicago's South Side, including Albertson's owned Jewel-Osco (15 stores), Aldi (14), Wal-Mart (5), Save-A-Lot (5) and Target (4).
After Aldi closed a location in Auburn-Gresham earlier this month, representatives of "The Food Empowerment Project," a "vegan food justice organization," told the Chicago Sun-Times that "an estimated 500,000 Chicago residents live in food deserts."
Chicagoland grocery chain Pete's Fresh Market, owned by Jimmy Dremonas of west suburban Burr Ridge, has seven stores serving the South Side.
In a Monday report, "food justice advocate" Elizabeth Abunaw told correspondent Patti Waldmeir of the London-based Financial Times that grocery chains are racist.
"You can call it market forces but those don't happen in a vacuum, there are underlying forces of segregation, red lining and zoning discrimination that cause inequality that breaks down along racial lines. And that is the definition of apartheid," she said.
Waldmeir lives in north suburban Evanston.
Abunaw, a graduate of University of Chicago's Booth Business School and Cornell University, received $2.5 million from City of Chicago taxpayers to open a "black owned grocery store" in Chicago's Austin neighborhood, on its far west side.
In 2019, Abunaw received a $185,000 grant from U.S. taxpayers and $150,000 from the American Heart Association "to expand its pop-up markets and food delivery service" in Austin. It also received $21,330 from The Reinvestment Fund, Inc. of Philadelphia, according to its 990 filing.
Amazon-owned Whole Foods made headlines last month when it exited the Englewood neighborhood in the same week it opened a store in the Gold Coast, one of Chicago’s wealthiest. This was despite receiving more than $16 million in taxpayer subsidies to open the South Side location less than six years ago.
Corporate giants Wal-Mart, Jewel-Osco, Aldi and Target have all operated South Side stores without city subsidies, in some cases for decades.
An analysis of Whole Foods locations in the Chicagoland region shows the Amazon chain caters to Chicago’s wealthiest neighborhoods, who have an average household income of more than $106,000. The Englewood neighborhood that Whole Foods abandoned last month had an average income of $23,000, according to census data.
Aldi is short for “Albrecht Discounts,” to the name of the German owner of the chain, founded in 1948. It stocks almost exclusively house-branded products.
It has 2,000 stores over 36 states in the U.S., including 210 in Illinois. The company’s U.S. headquarters is in west suburban Batavia.
St. Ann, Mo.-based Save-a-Lot Food Stores has 900 independently owned and operated stores across 32 U.S. states. Its first store was opened in Cahokia, Illinois, near St. Louis, in 1977. Its stores are typically 15,000 square feet-- about half the size of a typical grocery store.
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"Food desert"? Not exactly.
See the 89 grocery stores serving Chicago's South Side.
| Store | Address | Community |
| Food 4 Less | 12150 S. Pulaski Rd | Alsip |
| Jewel-Osco | 12001 S. Pulaski Rd. | Alsip |
| ALDI | 4934 S Kedzie Ave. | Archer Heights |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 4343 S. Pulaski Rd. | Archer Heights |
| Target | 4433 S Pulaski Rd | Archer Heights |
| Pete's Produce | 1543 E. 87th St. | Auburn Gresham |
| Food 4 Less | 4620 Damen Ave. | Back of the Yards |
| Supermercados El Guero | 1701 W. 47th St. | Back of the Yards |
| Walmart | 7050 S Cicero Ave. | Bedford Park |
| Jewel-Osco | 9400 S Ashland Ave. | Brainerd |
| Cermak Fresh Market | 3033 S. Halsted Ave. | Bridgeport |
| La Gloria Super Mercado | 4117 S. Kedzie Ave. | Brighton Park |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 4700 S. Kedzie Ave. | Brighton Park |
| Super Mercado El Ranchito | 2416 W. 47th St. | Brighton Park |
| Supermercados El Guero | 4023 S. Archer Ave. | Brighton Park |
| Jewel-Osco | 3357 S. King Dr. | Bronzeville |
| Mariano's | 3857 S Martin Luther King Dr. | Bronzeville |
| Jewel-Osco | 7910 S. Cicero Ave. | Burbank |
| Tony's Fresh Market | 7770 S. Cicero Ave. | Burbank |
| ALDI | 2333 E. 95th St. | Calumet Heights |
| Pete's Produce | 1411 W. 87th St. | Calumet Heights |
| ALDI | 13805 S. Ashland Ave. | Calumet Park |
| Fairplay Foods | 4640 S. Halsted St. | Canaryville |
| ALDI | 8500 S. Holland Road | Chatham |
| Food 4 Less | 112 W 87th St. | Chatham |
| Foodtown | 935 E. 79th St. | Chatham |
| Jewel-Osco | 87 W 87th St. | Chatham |
| Walmart | 8431 S Stewart Ave. | Chatham |
| Rio Valley Market | 3307 S. 63rd St. | Chicago Lawn |
| ALDI | 5501 S. Harlem | Clearing |
| Fair Share | 6422 W. 63rd St. | Clearing |
| Jewel-Osco | 6107 S. Archer Ave. | Clearing |
| Shop & Save | 5829 S. Archer Ave. | Clearing |
| Target | 7100 S Cicero Ave. | Clearing |
| ALDI | 10532 S. Indianapolis Ave. | East Side |
| ALDI | 620 W 63rd St. | Englewood |
| Food 4 Less | 7030 S Ashland Ave. | Englewood |
| Mariano's | 2559 W. 95th St. | Evergreen Park |
| Meijer | 9200 S. Western Ave. | Evergreen Park |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 3729 95th Street | Evergreen Park |
| Walmart | 2500 W. 95th St. | Evergreen Park |
| Whole Foods | 9600 S. Western Ave. | Evergreen Park |
| ALDI | 4501 S Pulaski Rd. | Gage Park |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 5724 S. Kedzie Ave. | Gage Park |
| ALDI | 7345 S State St. | Greater Grand Crossing |
| Supermercados El Guero | 2101 W. Cermak Rd. | Heart of Chicago |
| Eric's Food Center | 13209 S. Baltimore Ave. | Hegewisch |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 3448 E. 118th St. | Hegewisch |
| Hyde Park Produce Market | 1226 E. 53rd St. | Hyde Park |
| Jewel-Osco | 6014 S Cottage Grove Ave. | Hyde Park |
| Target | 1346 E 53rd St. | Hyde Park |
| Trader Joe's | 1528 E 55th St. | Hyde Park |
| Whole Foods | 5118 S Lake Park Ave. | Hyde Park |
| Fairplay Foods | 2200 S. Western Ave. | Little Village |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 2526 W. Cermak Rd. | Little Village |
| Walmart | 2551 W Cermak Rd. | Little Village |
| Cermak Fresh Market | 3435 S. Ashland Ave. | McKinley Park |
| Mariano's | 3145 S Ashland Ave. | McKinley Park |
| Target | 1940 W 33rd St. | McKinley Park |
| Jewel-Osco | 3243 W. 115th St. | Merrionette Park |
| Fairplay Foods | 2323 W. 111th St. | Morgan Park |
| Jewel-Osco | 11730 S Marshfield Ave. | Morgan Park |
| Jewel-Osco | 3128 W. 103rd St. | Mt. Greenwood |
| ALDI | 1508 W 47th St. | New City |
| Amazon Fresh | 4031 W. 95th St. | Oak Lawn |
| Fairplay Foods | 8700 S. Cicero Ave. | Oak Lawn |
| Jewel-Osco | 4650 W. 103rd St. | Oak Lawn |
| Jewel-Osco | 9424 S. Pulaski Rd. | Oak Lawn |
| Mariano's | 11000 S. Cicero Ave. | Oak Lawn |
| Target Grocery | 4120 W. 95th St. | Oak Lawn |
| Jewel-Osco | 1655 E 95th St. | Pullman |
| Walmart | 10900 S Doty Ave. | Roseland |
| La Fruteria | 8909 S. Commercial Ave. | South Chicago |
| Save-A-Lot | 2858 E 83rd St. | South Chicago |
| ALDI | 7800 South Chicago Ave. | South Shore |
| Jeffery Big Market | 2016 E. 71st St. | South Shore |
| Jewel-Osco | 7530 S Stony Island Ave. | South Shore |
| Save-A-Lot | 7240 S Stony Island Ave. | South Shore |
| Save-A-Lot | 344 E 63rd St. | Washington Park |
| Cermak Produce | 5220 S. Pulaski Rd. | West Elsdon |
| Jewel-Osco | 5320 S Pulaski Rd. | West Elsdon |
| La Gloria Super Mercado | 5054 S. Archer Ave. | West Elsdon |
| Supermercado Rivera | 4334 W. 51st St. | West Elsdon |
| ALDI | 6025 S Western Ave. | West Englewood |
| Pete's Fresh Market | 5838 S. Pulaski Rd. | West Lawn |
| Save-A-Lot | 4439 W 63rd St. | West Lawn |
| ALDI | 821 W 115th St. | West Pullman |
| Save-A-Lot | 10700 S Halsted St. | West Pullman |
| ALDI | 6621 S Cottage Grove Ave. | Woodlawn |
Sources: Corporate web sites; Google Maps
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