Well, this was a pleasant surprise to stumble upon … CHAMBERLIN’s, one of our favorite “old school” health food/grocery stores, is relocating from Winter Park to a new 10,000-square-foot store on East Colonial Drive near Orlando Executive Airport this July (in the location that used to be home to Party City)!
According to the Orlando Sentinel, Chamberlin’s closed its store in Winter Park Village last week to make room for upscale outdoors-gear seller REI. Chamberlin’s occupied the North Orlando Avenue spot for about four decades, watching the corridor turn from a mall into an upscale shopping center. The road also became a busy traffic route.
Winter Park has recently become filled with health-food stores, adding Trader Joe’s in 2014 with a new Whole Foods planned for later this year.
Chamberlin’s has been in the area since 1935 when it opened in downtown Orlando as Chamberlin’s Market and Café. Its shelves were stocked with whole-grain flours, beans and cereals and it remained much the same over the years.
After changing hands in 1972, it was eventually sold to Akin’s Natural Foods in Tulsa, Okla., in 2000.
It still has six smaller stores throughout the area that are about 6,000 square feet each. The Winter Park Village store had been the company’s biggest for several years; at about 12,000 square feet, it was the only one with produce and some other items.
The store will have much the same lineup of products, including vitamins and supplements.
Chamberlin’s takes the place of a former Party City store in the Herndon Village Shops plaza. The store will have about 25 employees with most moving from the Winter Park store.
REI is set to open at Winter Park Village in 2017.