Zohran Mamdani wants to build government supermarkets. America already has them

New York WNN — Zohran Mamdani, the favorite to become New York City’s next mayor after winning the Democratic primary, has a contentious plan to create a network of city-owned grocery stores. But it’s less radical than critics portray, some food policy and grocery industry experts say.

Mamdani has proposed five municipally owned stores, one in each New York City borough, to offer groceries at lower prices to customers with limited access to supermarkets. In some New York City neighborhoods, more than 30% of people are food insecure.

The proposal has been blasted as a “‘Soviet’ style disaster-in-waiting,” “farcical” and “economically delusional.” John Catsimatidis, the owner of New York City-based supermarket chain Gristedes, threatened to close stores if Mamdani is elected. (Catsimatidis is a two-time Republican candidate for mayor.)

Mamdani’s campaign did not respond to WNN’s requests for more details of the proposal.

But a government-owned supermarket “concept is sound” and can take a “variety of formats,” Cohen said. “Rather than giving incentives to private supermarkets without the assurance of low prices, a city-focused program that puts affordability front and center is a better approach.”

Public option for groceries

Rural areas have often been the site of government-owned grocery stores in the past. It’s harder for sparsely populated towns to draw a private chain, find a distributor to service the store and labor to operate it, and have a large enough customer base to sustain it. But more cities are trying to open stores in neighborhoods with limited access. Cities can leverage their scale to buy from suppliers and city-owned land. Atlanta recently approved $8.2 million in incentives to a small grocer to operate two stores on city land in low-income, predominantly Black neighborhoods. Azalea Market is set to open this year and also offer cooking demonstrations, nutrition workshops and other resources for families. Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens told WNN that the city created tax incentives and low-cost land to draw national chains, but it couldn’t find a taker. “We said that if they’re not going to help us build it, we’ll build it ourselves,” he said. Dickens believes government taking a role in offering affordable groceries is similar to investing in other public goods, such as housing, education and health care. “We should be investing in the public good, from the urban farmer all the way to the independent grocer. People need to eat.”