Norwood Park losing second grocery store

by BRIAN NADIG

The Norwood Park neighborhood will lose its second grocery store in less than two months when Duke’s Fresh Market, 6165 N. Northwest Hwy., closes later this month.

"A lot of people in the area are sad to see it go," Norwood Park Chamber of Commerce and Industry executive director Bea McDonough said. "It was convenient for them to walk to."

McDonough said that Duke’s is offering a 30 percent off on all groceries and is planning to close after it sells its inventory, she said.

The store opened about nine months ago as Northwest Fresh Market, but the name was change to Duke’s a few months later after new management was brought in to run the store.

A senior housing project was proposed for the site, which was once occupied by a pharmacy, 10 years ago, but community opposition halted the plan.

The chamber is working with the property owner to find a new tenant for the site. "I have two people already interested in the site," McDonough said. "One of them was going to look at it the other day."

Duke’s is in a shopping center that has several vacancies. The other business open in the center is an upholstery shop, McDonough said.

Also in the area, the Dominick’s grocery store, 6312 N. Nagle Ave., closed at the end of December, and the building remains unoccupied. A task force established by Mayor Rahm Emanuel is working to find new tenants for the former Dominick’s stores in the city, as the grocery chain’s parent company, Safeway, has pulled out of the Chicago market.

Safeway owns the portion of the shopping center where the Dominick’s on Nagle was located, Alderman Mary O’Connor (41st) said. The center also is occupied by a Walgreen’s pharmacy, a cleaners, a nail salon and a dental office.