Aaron Hughes, a resident of West Garfield Park, said that he understood that the neighborhood Save A Lot location at 420 S. Pulaski Road had its problems. But the alternative the neighborhood now faces– the store closed – is far worse.
“Some people might complain, but guess what – it [was] here,” Hughes told Austin Weekly. “It’s better than nothing. It’s better than having no grocery store at all.”
“This is going to be a blow to the community itself,” Hughes said.
The location was among the seven Save A Lots operated by Ohio-based Yellow Banana that closed on Sunday, July 26. The operator took over the store in 2023, after the city ordered it shut down in February 2022 due to a rat infestation. The location reopened under Yellow Banana’s management in September 2024.
The store employees confirmed the closure when Austin Weekly News stopped by on July 25, the last day of operations. They indicated that Save A Lot didn’t offer them jobs at any other locations, and they will be out of the job once the operations wind down.
The closing once again leaves West Garfield Park without any full-fledged grocery stores. The neighborhood Aldi location abruptly shut down in October 2021. Catholic Charities shut down the grocery store for families enrolled in the federal Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), located at 3932 W. Madison St., sometime in 2024.
In a video posted on his political Facebook page, Ald. Jason Ervin (28th), whose ward includes West Garfield Park, decried the closure.
“Some of our residents of West Garfield Park don’t have the option to be able to go somewhere else,” he said. “They’ll be forced to utilize convenience stores, pay high prices and get garbage food.”
Ervin said he “will continue to fight to get us what we deserve, nothing less.”
“We want the same quality foods that you see in other communities on the West Side of Chicago,” he said. “That’s why I’m currently working with new grocers that will bring us those options. Our residents deserve better, and I will not stop fighting until we get it.”
Even before the city shut down the West Garfield Park Save A Lot in 2022, the location faced complaints about expired food and unsanitary conditions. But the shortage of grocery stores on the West Side meant residents didn’t have much in the way of an alternative, especially after Aldi’s closure.
When a grocery store shuts down on the West Side, it seldom gets replaced, and even when it does, it sometimes takes years. For example, after Save A Lot abruptly shut down its Austin, 5555 W. North Ave. location in December 2020, the building remained vacant until this February, when father-son team Ali and Khaldoon Omer reopened it as Central Fresh Market.
In November 2024, the city approved a proposal to redevelop the former West Garfield Park Aldi site and the few blocks further west into a mixed-use development that would include a grocery store. But, since then, there has been little traction, and the old Aldi site remains vacant.
A few months after the West Garfield Park Save A Lot’s closure, Yellow Banana, which operated 38 locations for the chain outside Illinois, announced that it would rehab and reopen it and five South Side stores the chain closed in the 2010s and 2020s. Chicago City Council approved $13.5 million in Tax Increment Financing (TIF) funds, another $13 million in New Market Tax Credits and private funding to help make that happen.
A redevelopment agreement with the city required the company to open all six stores by March 2025 or lose the TIF dollars – a deadline that Yellow Banana was able to make in spite of numerous delays.
In a separate arrangement, Yellow Banana reopened a closed Whole Foods location in the South Side’s Englewood neighborhood as a Save A Lot
According to Supermarket News, all seven stores struggled to make a profit – an issue further compounded by reduced Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) revenue in the wake of cuts included in President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. In April, Yellow Banana CEO Joe Canfield, who was described as a major force behind the Chicago operations, died of a stroke.
For the past few months, Save A Lot reportedly “took on additional operational responsibilities to keep these stores open and maintain continued service to customers.” But on July 21, it announced that it was terminating its relationship with Yellow Banana and closing the seven stores unless an investor comes through with funding.
The development agreement required the six TIF-supported stores to remain open through 2035. If they close permanently, they must be re-occupied by a grocer within a year to avoid a default. Chicago Department of Planning and Development previously indicated that it was prepared to take legal action to claw back the funds.
When Austin Weekly News visited the store last Saturday, most of the shelves – including meats and fresh produce sections – were barren. Much of the remaining inventory was marked down with 25% or 50% discounts. A small, but steady stream of customers came in, but many left empty-handed as they realized that what they were looking for was already out of stock.
Hughes said he lives a few blocks from the store, and he will miss the convenience. As he noted, the closest grocery stores – Leamington Foods in Austin, at 5467 W. Madison St., Freshway Market in North Lawndale, at 3240 W Roosevelt Rd, and Aldi in Humboldt Park, at 800 N Kedzie Ave. – require multiple buses to reach. For many regulars, Hughes said, that would not be worth the trouble.
He said he feels especially sorry for seniors who live at the Irene McCoy Gaines Apartments, a subsidized senior housing development at 3700 W. Congress Pkwy.
“They come here all the time with their walkers,” Hughes said.
He also said that “as a working-class person,” he was concerned about what’s going to happen with the employees.
“When they [reopened after the renovation], there were a lot of jobs, and a lot of folks in the community were getting those jobs,” he said.
