Whole Foods Plans 58,000-SF 'Front Door' at AOL Time Warner Center

NEW YORK CITY-Austin, TX-based Whole Foods Markets will bring a much-needed element to the high-end retail mix at AOL Time Warner Center with its deal to open a 58,000-sf store at the 2.1 million-sf development. And initial reports on the project suggest a supermarket so spectacular that one insider says the entire complex may one day be known as “the Whole Foods building.”

Whole Foods’ New York City flagship will be located on concourse one, within the complex’s Shops at Columbus Circle retail center. The store is sure to be a welcome addition to the area, where supermarkets are few and far between.

Chase Welles, a vice president and regional director at Seattle-based Northwest Atlantic Real Estate Services’ East Coast office in White Plains, brokered for Whole Foods. (Northwest’s roster of national tenants includes Washington Mutual, Starbucks and Hollywood Video.) The ownership was self-represented. While terms of the deal have not been released, Whole Foods leases typically run 40 years.