A new Tesco Fresh & Easy small-format, convenience-oriented grocery store will serve as the retail anchor for the just-announced $20 million Plaza Calle Tampico retail shops development located at Calle Tampico and Desert Cove Drive in the Southern California desert region city of La Quinta, the Palm Springs Desert Sun is reporting in today's edition.
The expansion is part of a retail area called La Quinta Cove in what's referred to as the city's "Old Town" area.
Stacy Wiedmaier, a staff reporter for the La Quinta Sun, the Desert Sun's sister newspaper, reports the Tesco Fresh & Easy grocery market will serve as the retail anchor for about 15 other retail stores in the new shopping center. She further reports Fresh & Easy is the first and thus far only announced tenant for the center.
As we've reported on Fresh & Easy Buzz before, La Quinta is part of the Southern California desert region that includes in addition to La Quinta cities such as Palm Springs, Palm Desert, Indio, Cathedral City, Hemet and others.
Tesco has or will soon open one or more Fresh & Easy grocery stores in each of the cities mentioned above, as well as in other cities in the desert region. The very first Fresh & Easy store was opened in the desert region city of Hemet in late October, 2007.
The region is generally upper income demographically, although it also has many middle and lower income residents who live in the area's city's and work in its tourism and hospitality industries. Tourism--golf, spa's, conventions, dining, lodging and other recreational activities--is the region's number one source of economic activity.
The region is a popular place for residents from throughout Southern California on a regular basis in the winter months. Many have weekend homes in the desert area, which has temperatures of 75-85 degrees during much of the winter. Others spend weekends there staying in hotels or at the region's numerous resorts.
The desert region is believed to have the most golf courses per-capita in the United States. Among the region's famous residents have included the late Frank Sinatra, Bob Hope and former U.S. President Gerald Ford. All three lived in Palm Desert before their deaths.
The region is one of Tesco's key target markets for its small-format Fresh & Easy, combination basic grocery and fresh foods grocery stores. Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA corporate offices and distribution center also are located nearby, in Riverside County.
Tesco currently has 61 Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market grocery stores open and operating in Southern California, Arizona and Nevada.
The retailer is taking a new store opening pause until early July, when it plans to resume opening more Fresh & Easy stores at a rapid pace.
As Fresh & Easy Buzz has written before, based on our tracking and calculations, a new Fresh & Easy grocery store has been opened by Tesco since the first store opened in the Desert region city of Hemet in late October, 2007, until the first week of April, 2008, about every 2.5 -to- 3 days.
Because the new Fresh & Easy grocery market in the La Quinta "Old Town" development will be built from the ground up, it will look similar on the exterior to the Fresh & Easy new store prototype drawing pictured at the top of this post.
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