Safeway

Howard County's Planning Board won't vote on plans for a Wegmans supermarket in Columbia until Jan. 31, but a vital element of the project was decided last month out of public view. The traffic plan for the 160,000-square-foot, two-story store and its 939 parking spaces was approved internally by county planners in December without a public hearing, said county planning supervisor Kent Sheubrooks. "I was surprised," said Grace Kubofcik, co-president of the county League of Women Voters, who attended a Planning Board hearing on the building plans last week.

Union workers at Safeway and Giant Food in the Baltimore and Washington regions overwhelmingly approved a new contract Tuesday that increases wages and maintains key benefits. "It's a good day to be a member," said Tim Goins, executive vice president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 27 in Baltimore, which represents 8,500 Giant and Safeway cashiers, meat cutters and produce and deli workers in Central Maryland and on the Eastern Shore. Local 27 members and Washington area workers with Local 400 in Landover voted in separate meetings.

Giant Food and Safeway, the Baltimore region's two largest supermarket chains, are recruiting temporary workers as contract negotiations continue with the union that represents 23,000 employees. The current agreement expires March 31. The companies said hiring additional staffing was standard during contract talks. Safeway said in a newspaper advertisement that it was seeking applications for temporary workers "due to a possible labor dispute. " "In the event of a work stoppage, we'll be able to keep our stores up and running and serve our customers," Giant spokesman Jamie Miller said Tuesday, noting that both grocers sought temporary workers during the last contract talks, in 2008.

The union that represents 23,000 Giant Food and Safeway workers reached a tentative contract agreement with management late Wednesday, just days shy of Friday's deadline. The details of the new contract were not released Thursday. The United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 400 in Landover and Local 27 in Baltimore had been negotiating for a new deal since January. Union leaders reported little progress in talks in recent days, but a tentative deal was reached around 11 p.m. Wednesday.

Safeway Inc. launched a "Safeway Savings Club" card this week at its 12 supermarkets in the Baltimore area. When used at the checkout lanes, the card electronically gives customers discounts of 10 percent to 20 percent on an ever-changing group of store specials.Safeway is touting the buyer service as a way to avoid time-consuming coupon-clipping, but the card also helps the state's second-largest supermarket chain identify an individual's shopping patterns for future manufacturer promotions.

Two employees of the Safeway store in Harpers Choice Village Center in Columbia were robbed at gunpoint outside the store about 11: 30 p.m. Saturday, Howard County police said.Police said the workers were walking toward the store at 5485 Harpers Farm Road when two men, at least one with a handgun, approached them from behind and demanded money. The victims turned over their cash and the robbers fled, police said.Pub Date: 3/09/98

The Safeway sign in the Kings Contrivance village center has been torn down and the 40,733-square-foot structure will soon meet the same fate, paving the way for a new supermarket chain scheduled to open as soon as July next year. The Safeway closed its doors June 3 to make way for a Harris Teeter supermarket. In January, Kimco Realty Corp., a New Hyde Park, N.Y., company that owns the village center, announced that the North Carolina-based supermarket was coming. Harris Teeter is viewed by retail experts as an upscale supermarket chain, with 149 stores across the nation.

Safeway Inc. has brought its popular coupon booklet into the electronic age.Rather than clipping coupons from a booklet that's sent to area households, consumers can save on selected items with the swipe of a card.This week, the grocery chain is replacing the booklet with a new Safeway Club Card, offering savings of up to 50 percent on advertised items, said Greg TenEyck, spokesman for the chain's eastern division.The new marketing initiative to make coupons more convenient comes at a time when supermarket chains are locked in a heated battle over customer loyalty.

GREENBELT -- Safeway's customers here looked skeptical at first.But many eventually made their way with relative ease through the four do-it-yourself checkout lanes -- the first of their kind in Maryland."

It's fast becoming another sign of spring as local school officials sort and bundle the last of the supermarket check-out receipts that can be redeemed for computers and computer equipment.The equipment giveaway programs, both in their second year, are sponsored by Giant Food and Safeway Inc. They are offering Apple and IBM computers to area schools that collect enough receipts to qualify.Giant has set March 16 as the last day schools can turn in their pink receipts and qualify in the chain's Apples for Students program.

Wegmans Food Markets Inc. said today they will also stop selling meat with an additive known as pink slime. Thebyproduct comes from fatty scraps leftover after steaks and roasts are cut from a cow. The meat bits are heated to soften them and then spun to remove the fat and separate the meat. Ammonia is used to kill bacteria. The filler is sometimes mixed into fattier meat to create a leaner product. The USDA said pink slime passes food safety standards but many retailers have been pulling it from shelves because of concern from shoppers.

Giant Food, the region's largest grocery chain, became the latest area supermarket Thursday to declare it would stop selling meat with the additive known as pink slime. The Landover-based company is among a growing number of supermarkets pulling the product from its shelves because of concern from shoppers, even though food regulators say pink slime, also known as "finely textured beef," passes food safety standards. "While the USDA … has indicated this product is safe for consumption and complies with all applicable standards for lean beef, many of our customers voiced concern regarding finely textured beef," Giant said in a statement.

Contract negotiations between management and the union representing workers at Giant Food and Safeway are expected to continue Tuesday, said a union spokeswoman, who added that no progress had been reported so far. The contract between the grocery chains and the union, which represents 23,000 employees in the Baltimore-Washington region, expires March 31. On Monday, the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 400 in Landover said five...

Giant Food and Safeway, the Baltimore region's two largest supermarket chains, are recruiting temporary workers as contract negotiations continue with the union that represents 23,000 employees. The current agreement expires March 31. The companies said hiring additional staffing was standard during contract talks. Safeway said in a newspaper advertisement that it was seeking applications for temporary workers "due to a possible labor dispute. " "In the event of a work stoppage, we'll be able to keep our stores up and running and serve our customers," Giant spokesman Jamie Miller said Tuesday, noting that both grocers sought temporary workers during the last contract talks, in 2008.

The union that represents 17,000 workers at the region's two largest supermarket chains is embracing the "occupy" movement as it begins contract talks Wednesday. Anticipating difficult bargaining with Safeway and Giant Foods, the union has launched a website, occupygiantandsafeway.org, to build public support for its cause. The contract expires March 31. Tom McNutt, president of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 400, said in a speech to union organizers last week that employees have worked hard over the last three decades to make the grocery chains highly profitable — while, he said, top executives are "making the Sheriff of Nottingham look like a saint.

A homeless man suffered second and third degree burns that covered about 75 percent of his body after he caught fire Wednesday afternoon outside the Canton Safeway supermarket, fire officials said. Firefighters were called to the 2600 block of Boston Street about 1:45 p.m. for reports of a brush fire when they found the unidentified man who had caught fire, said Kevin Cartwright, a fire department spokesman. The unidentified man was taken to Bayview Medical Center, where he remains in serious condition, Cartwright said.

The delayed, much-anticipated renovation of the Long Reach Village Center will begin next week, a spokeswoman for Safeway grocery chain said yesterday."

Lower Charles Village seems to have everything -- homes, small businesses, shops, a diverse population, even a public radio station. But one thing it lacks is a full-service supermarket.For heavy-duty shopping, residents must pay high prices at smaller stores or travel to markets outside their community, such as the Rotunda shopping center north of Hampden, the Super Foods store at North and Maryland avenues or Eddie's in the 3100 block of St. Paul St.Neighborhood residents seem divided over whether the Safeway would help or hurt the character of their community.

Seven Mile Market in Pikesville launched what's thought to be the nation's largest kosher supermarket Tuesday, offering shoppers kosher versions of almost everything they could find in a conventional grocery store. Everything, that is, but bugs in the salad bar. And baby seahorses in the sushi. "People are not aware their salads have quite a few insects in them," said Rabbi Mayer Kurcfeld of STAR-K Kosher Certification, explaining that the newly relocated and expanded market has a kosher inspector who checks all salad greens for bugs.

Seven Mile Market, a kosher supermarket in Pikesville that has drawn Jewish residents and others from around the region, plans to move and double in size - likely making it the largest operation of its kind in the nation. The market, which opened in 1988, is moving to a Safeway store on Reisterstown Road near its current location on Seven Mile Lane. Already known for offering a wide variety of meat, fish, baked goods and other foods, the market will expand its product offerings as it moves into 55,000 square feet from its current 28,000-square-foot location.