“It’s sad to see something like this go.”
Stow Mayor John Pribonic said this as he walked through the now mostly closed Acme Fresh Market on Kent Road. Acme officials announced May 4 that the much of the store would permanently close the next day, though the pharmacy will remain open until May 19.
“It’s bittersweet, since I live in Stow,” Pribonic said.
And, in many ways, it’s personal.
Pribonic worked for Acme for more than four decades, including more than 10 years as the store director at the Stow location.
“I started out as a stockboy and worked my way up,” he said. “I worked for Acme for 42 years. My dad worked for Acme; he was director of personnel. That is what is unique about Acme. We are right at the beginning level and you moved up.
“That was the secret of the business. It’s a family-owned and operated business, and it felt like family. The Albrecht family has always been great to me,” he said, referring to the family that founded the Akron-based chain and still owns it today.
However, Pribonic said the Stow location faced a lot of competition, including from other nearby Acme Fresh Market stores. Three Acmes had been built along state Route 59: a Kent location, the Stow location and one in Cuyahoga Falls, on the corner of Route 59 and Bailey Road.
In addition, Hudson has an Acme on state Route 303 and there’s a second Cuyahoga Falls location on State Road. The Stow location, Pribonic said, was part of the most densely concentrated area of Acme stores.
“We often called it the cream center of the Oreo,” Pribonic said of the Stow location, with it being sandwiched between the Kent and Cuyahoga Falls’ Bailey Road stores. “We split a lot of our customers.”
Stow Acme location has more than 60 year history
The Stow location was the first Acme Click store when it opened in 1965, which combined the concept of a grocery store and a department store, Pribonic said.
“Where the Huntington Bank is was a gas station,” Pribonic said, pointing to the newly opened bank located at the far end of Acme’s parking lot near Kent Road. “There also used to be a car wash, which Albrecht owned, near the side of the store. This place was ahead of its time.”
Acme was transitioning from the Acme Click concept when Pribonic came to the Stow store. The location had closed for three months and downsized from around 200,000 square feet to 70,000 square feet as part of a $20 million renovation project at 15 stores.
The Stow location reopened as an Acme Fresh Market on Halloween in 1999.
Before coming to the Stow Acme, Pribonic said he worked at the Cuyahoga Falls grocery store on State Road. Pribonic also was at the Parma location, which closed late last year.
In late 2011, the Stow Acme underwent more than $3 million in renovations, which included remodeling the interior, improving the parking lot and adding an “express care” clinic featuring a nurse practitioner.
Stow mayor carries lessons from years at Acme into current role
Pribonic said that he worked at Acme even while he served on the Stow-Munroe Falls school board and on Stow’s City Council.
He stepped away from the grocery business once he became mayor, but he credits what he learned in the grocery business with helping him in his current role.
“My time working at this store, I got to know the people not just as customers,” Pribonic said. “Many things I learned through Acme I transferred over to my role as mayor. It’s operating the store, in a much larger scale, being mayor. I still make decisions based on what I learned from [former Acme Fresh Market President] Steve Albrecht. We don’t just sell food — we feed families.”
Albrecht’s great-grandfather founded the Fred W. Albrecht Grocery store in Akron in 1891.
Though seeing the store closing is sad, Pribonic said he believes there will be options to fill the vacant space.
“I’m proud of the diversity of retailers we have here,” he said. “We could have one larger store — there’s a lot of space — or maybe we could subdivide it.”
Reporter April Helms can be reached at ahelms@thebeaconjournal.com
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Stow Mayor John Pribonic reflects on closure of Acme store he once ran
Reporting by April Helms, Akron Beacon Journal / Akron Beacon Journal
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