PORTLAND —The Trader Joe’s rumor mill has been churning overtime, so let’s start by setting a couple of things straight.
First, despite the rampant Internet speculation and breathless phone calls to the new store at 87 Marginal Way, there will not be a soft opening on Thursday.
The grand opening is still scheduled for Friday at 8 a.m. and will feature a “ceremonial lei cutting,” live music, hourly drawings for bags of Trader Joe’s products, and children’s activities.
And yes, the store will carry “Two Buck Chuck.” The wine will sell in Portland for $2.59 a bottle, about 40 cents less than in Trader Joe’s Massachusetts stores. There is already a tower of it in the Portland store, stacked in cases along a back wall.
“We will have sufficient quantities to supply the state of Maine this weekend and beyond,” Tracy Acciola, Portland’s “store captain,” joked during a private tour of the new store Wednesday. “We don’t want to run out, for sure.”
As workers put the finishing touches on the Portland store Wednesday – an employee was painting hibiscus flowers on one wall – Acciola described the reaction employees have been getting from wannabe customers.
People have been coming up to the store’s locked doors and waving at employees, or they give a thumbs-up sign, she said. Others come carrying signs that say things like “We Love Trader Joe’s” and “About Time.”
Acciola, wearing the Trader Joe employee’s signature Hawaiian shirt, said she’s been getting lots of phone calls, too, from people who have heard the soft-opening rumor or another rumor that says the store isn’t opening until Monday. A couple of callers have even said they’re taking the day off work Friday, or pulling their child out of school, so they can shop on the store’s opening day.
The Portland store, which will be open from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily, is mostly stocked and ready for shoppers. Produce will arrive Thursday night and Friday so it will be as fresh as possible, Acciola said, and flowers will arrive Friday morning.
For more details, see Thursday’s edition of the Portland Press Herald.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
