GREENVILLE, S.C. — A grocery anchor that sat dark for roughly five years on one of Greenville’s busiest north-side corridors is back in business. Food Lion held the grand opening of its renovated store at 2111 N. Pleasantburg Drive on Oct. 21, according to a company release, filling the former Bi-Lo space at the corner of North Pleasantburg Drive and Rutherford Road.
The building measures about 42,000 square feet, according to The Post and Courier, and sits in the Field Plaza Shopping Center, Hoodline reported. Bi-Lo, a chain that was founded in Greenville in the 1960s, closed the store in 2021, the same year the brand was discontinued. The Post and Courier reported in February that the empty grocery box dominated a shopping center that had become largely vacant, and that Food Lion spokeswoman Katherine Kirby said the company planned to open there before the end of 2026. Trade publication The Shelby Report described the store as a former Bi-Lo location that Food Lion acquired and renovated.
The Salisbury, N.C.-based grocer said the Greenville opening, along with a store that opened Oct. 14 in Lavonia, Ga., brings its greater Greenville market network to 49 locations. The two stores are among 10 new Food Lion locations scheduled to open this year, the company said. The Greenville store is open daily from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. and offers self-checkout alongside staffed lanes, prepared meals, a self-service wing and hot food bar, and pickup and delivery through Instacart, DoorDash and Uber Eats. Chris Tague is the store manager. Food Lion, a company of Ahold Delhaize USA, operates more than 1,100 stores in 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states.
As part of the opening, the company’s Food Lion Feeds program donated $2,500 to Catholic Charities in Greenville, which will also regularly collect unsaleable, edible food from the store, according to the release. The release did not disclose the number of jobs created or the cost of the renovation.
The opening continues a run of new grocery activity in Greenville County. Hoodline noted that Food Lion opened a 37,000-square-foot store in March near West Georgia Road and Fork Shoals Road in Simpsonville, its fifth location in that area, and that the chain has reported 52 consecutive quarters of positive same-store sales growth.
For brokers and investors, the deal is a notable example of a second-generation grocery box finding a new operator after years on the market. Grocery anchors typically drive daily traffic to neighboring inline space, and the return of a full-service supermarket could improve leasing prospects for the remaining vacancies at Field Plaza and nearby retail along the North Pleasantburg corridor. It also signals that regional chains remain willing to retrofit older, mid-size grocery buildings rather than build new, a trend that can shorten timelines and lower costs for landlords holding legacy shopping centers.
Sources: Food Lion release via GlobeNewswire, The Shelby Report, The Post and Courier, Hoodline
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