BELLEVUE, WA — November 11, 2010 — When the greenest Safeway in the company’s Seattle Division opens at 8:00 a.m. on November 12 at 12318 15th NE in Seattle, not only will it provide a friendlier shopping setting for customers, but it will also have a friendlier impact on the environment. The new store is the greenest Safeway yet in the Seattle Division, and serves as the prototype for future stores.
Festivities celebrating the Pinehurst store grand opening begin on Thursday, November 11 with a limited Sneak Preview open to the public from 4:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. that will be attended by city officials and community leaders. The official grand opening ceremony with ribbon cutting will take place the following morning, Friday, November 12 at 8:00 a.m.
The Pinehurst Safeway is a ground-up replacement store for the Safeway that originally opened in 1923 serving the community for 87 years. Touted as the “greenest” store in the Seattle Division fleet, the Pinehurst Safeway was designed to Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) silver certification standards, a designation given only to buildings that meet strict standards of sustainable design, construction and operating practices. The 47,000-square-foot store features environmentally focused innovations such as:
- Store will use at least 17 percent less energy than an ASHRAE-baseline building. This translates to an average savings of $31,000 per year.
- Approximately 20% of the building materials purchased on the job, by cost, will contain recycled content.
- Approximately 75% of the construction waste, by weight, will have been diverted from the landfill.
- Approximately 10% of the materials purchased on the job, by cost, will have been harvested and manufactured within 500 miles of the project site.
- All paints, coatings, adhesives, sealants, flooring, furniture, ceilings and wall systems meet strict standards for indoor air quality and low volatile organic compounds (VOCs).
- The Protocol refrigeration system saves over $10,000 per year. Its energy efficiency amounts to taking more than 160 cars off the roads and planting more than 250 acres of trees per year.
- The state-of-the-art exterior signage is constructed from environmentally friendly LED lighting, which uses less electricity than standard signage.
- Bioswale collects runoff from impervious surfaces in the right-of-way and filters water before it re-enters the ground.
- The bioswale filtration also removes 80 percent of the Total Suspended Solids (TSS) from over 90 percent of the storm water.
- Green screen installations help minimize heat reflecting from the building out into the neighborhood, helping to reduce the urban heat island effect.
- Preferred parking spaces are provided for low emission and fuel-efficient vehicles.
In addition to the environmentally friendly construction of the Pinehurst store, Safeway earns its title as one of the greenest retailers in Washington with environmentally sustainable practices throughout all its stores:
- Safeway recycles almost 100 percent of the cardboard they use.
- Safeway recycles 100 percent of their plastic (including plastic bags that customers bring in), fat, bone and grease.
- All stores feature the Safeway lines of Eating Right, O Organic and Bright Green products to support healthy and environmentally friendly living.
“We are proud of the reputation we have developed for sustainability and believe our new Pinehurst store enhances the progress we are making as a leader in sustainable efforts, including store design and earth-friendly products, along with our already strong history of supporting communities,” stated Greg Sparks, President of Safeway’s Seattle Division. “Our new Pinehurst store reflects the silver standard for sustainable supermarket design for Safeway and the entire supermarket industry,” said Sparks.
In addition to the green aspects of the Pinehurst store, it boasts wall to wall specialty items ranging from: Starbucks coffee kiosk with indoor/outdoor seating and fireplace, soup & olive bars, Cheese World and deli department, bakery department, elite wine area, pharmacy, organic produce, service fish and meat, outdoor seating in front of store/urban garden with seating along 15th and many other surprises. The new store, managed by Lori Gruber, employs 110 employees, an increase of 65 from the former store’s 45 employees. In total, the Pinehurst grand opening represents the completion of a project cost exceeding $18 million dollars, and an annual tax base in 2010 of $45,107 and a projected tax base of $180,000 in 2011.
Safeway has pledged a commitment to a sustainable future that makes the company a leader in the industry. Safeway's corporate construction and design department has developed a sustainable construction process using the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED portfolio program as a benchmark for improving the environmental footprint of its stores.
ABOUT SAFEWAY www.Safeway.com
Safeway Inc. is a Fortune 100 company and one of the largest food and drug retailers in North America, based on sales. The company operates 1,712 stores in the United States and western Canada and had annual sales of $40.8 billion in 2009. The company's common stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol SWY.
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