Fresno bound at fresh&easy

Last week, we held an event at our Downtown Fresno store to announce the opening dates for our first few stores in the Fresno area.

-- Lemoore & Cinnamon, Lemoore: December 2nd
-- Tulare & R, Fresno: January 13th
-- Cedar & Nees, Fresno: January 13th
-- Shaw & Willow, Clovis: January 13th

The outpouring of support from the community and city government in Fresno was a great indication of what lies ahead for Fresh & Easy. A big thank you to Fresno City Council President Cynthia Sterling, City Council Member Lee Brand and Redevelopment Agency Exec Director Marlene Murphey who were on hand to speak.



With these six stores we are proud to be creating 125 more good paying, quality jobs with comprehensive benefits. If you are interested in joining our team, job listings and the application process are posted here.



For more on the Fresno story check out what Fresno bloggers like The Fresnan, Fresno Fusion and the Fresno Bee News Blog have to say about it.

AIDS Walk 2009 With fresh&easy

On Sunday October 18th, a large group of us met up in West Hollywood decked out in our fresh&easy green for the 25th Annual AIDS Walk.

Friends and family joined our fresh&easy team and together we raised about $10,000 for this great cause. It was our third year participating and we look forward to doing it again next year!

Cheers,
Gary

Gift cards worth giving

You told us you wanted gift cards and we listened!

Fresh&Easy gift cards are now available in $25 or $50 denominations just in time for the gift-giving season. Now giving the gift of wholesome products to your friends and family is even easier.

These convenient gift cards are the perfect gift - we wouldn't blame you for putting them on your own wish list!

You can find the fresh&easy gift cards at the front of our stores.

Cheers!
~SallieB

LEEDing the way to gold certification

Last month we took another big step in our commitment to being a green retailer – we opened our first LEED® Gold Certified store! LEED is the nation’s preeminent program for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings.



Our Cathedral City store achieved LEED certification for energy use, lighting, water use and incorporating a variety of other sustainable strategies, such as using 90 percent recycled steel for the building’s structure. On average, all of Fresh & Easy stores use 30% less energy than a typical supermarket and utilize technologies like solar tracking skylights, automatically dimming lights, and LED lighting.



We are also pilot members of the LEED Volume Certification Program which allows companies building multiple buildings with similar formats to streamline the certification process. Because of our membership, we look forward to several future LEED certified stores to come.

Of course, we do this not just because it’s the right thing to do for the environment – it also helps keep our costs (and your grocery bill) down!

Take a look at what these blogs had to say about our opening:

Mother Nature Network
Greenandsave.com
Green Retailing News

You can visit the Green Building section of our web site for more info!

Shop for Schools

Two weeks ago we launched our Shop for Schools program at the opening of our 126th location in Long Beach.

Earlier this year we piloted the program to raise money for K-8th grade schools in the neighborhoods around our stores. We saw an incredible response as schools raised more than $130,000 for whatever they need the funds for. Our store employees, parents and customers all pitched in with ways to enhance the program for this year’s version, so we are hopeful that even more schools will participate!

We have also added a Shopping Night to the program, which allows all registered schools to receive 5% of a store’s sales on a particular evening. One of our Las Vegas team members – Jackie Urban –came up with the idea, which we tried out with such success we decided to roll it out for all of our participating schools.

Check out a video on Shop for Schools from earlier this year.

Be sure to check with your local school to see if they are participating – it is not too late to participate! Schools have until October 1st (THURSDAY!) to sign-up at our website