The North Andover Market Basket store closed Thursday night after 44 years of operation, only to be re-opened next door Friday morning.
Hundreds of customers flocked to the fully stocked aisles as they picked up their weekly staples as suited-up employees greeted them with “opening day” coupons.
Leanne Paradiso, 37 of North Andover, was thrilled about the store’s reopening and the $5.99 per pound of lobster deal.
“I’ve been going to the Market Basket next door since we moved into North Andover,” she said. “The staff is really friendly and the prices are great, so it’s as good a time as grocery shopping can be.”
The new store added 176 new jobs across the renovated butcher shop, cafe, and bakery, and it now has a total of 450 workers, according to the store’s director Mark Gouthier, who has worked at the company for more than four decades.
“The outcome today is unbelievable. If you walk through the store you can see how enthusiastic everybody is,” said Gouthier, who estimates upwards of 16,000 to 18,000 visitors on Friday.
Market Basket’s North Andover store first opened in 1968 under the family name Demoulas in the mall’s south end, where the 1950s Den Rock Drive In was located and TJ Maxx is today. Then, in 1981, it relocated to the mall’s north end and later changed its name to Market Basket.
Now, the store expanded again in a $60 million investment and moved to a 92,000-square-foot space in the same lot, formerly a Kohl’s retail store, adding to its growing portfolio of more than 90 locations across New England, according to the company. A TJX company will move into 40,000 square feet of the vacant Market Basket lot following a two-year renovation, leaving an additional 17,000 square feet for another retail store, according to a 2024 North Andover meeting agenda.
Price accuracy coordinator Kerry Brown, 56, donned her worker badge today as she’s done for the past 41 years. She joined Market Basket’s North Andover store when she was 15, and she stuck around for the “great people” and company culture.
“The relationship with the customers is great,” Brown said. “I just had a customer text and asked how today was going and said good luck.”
But outside the grand opening, there were reminders that the $8 billion family-owned business is in grave turmoil.
Sixty-eight-year-old George Simolaris of Billerica held handmade signs and played the trumpet by himself to thousands of cars coming in and out of the North Andover Mall lot Friday morning. His cause? The return of Market Basket’s sidelined chief executive, Arthur T. Demoulas, who has been on paid leave since May.
Simolaris is a longtime advocate for Demoulas, and participated in a boycott and protests against the removal of Demoulas from the company in 2014. Demoulas now owns 28 percent of the company following buyout that year, and his three sisters — Caren, Frances, and Glorianne — each control 20 percent and vote as a majority. The rest sits in a trust for the family’s younger generations.
Now, the company’s leadership is facing another rift over the company’s future, and who will succeed the 70-year-old chief executive.
“Arthur T. is very people oriented,” Simolaris said. “He cares about the employees and the customers and I think that after all the fights he’s been involved in, that we deserve to hear what he has to say at least.”
Simolaris said people online had attempted to organize a a large protest and boycott of the opening, but that only one other person showed up. The packed parking lot had multiple police cars watching for any disruption, which to Simolaris’ disappointment did not happen.
Market Basket board member Michael Keyes attended the North Andover store reopening, but declined to comment about recent developments between shareholders.
“This is a day of celebration, and I honestly feel I would be disrespectful to the amount of time and effort the associates put in to make today successful,” Keyes said.
Keyes added that even without Arthur T. Demoulas present, the store’s familial feeling remains. He said all of the Demoulas sisters came into the store and greeted employees and customers.
The Market Basket board and Demoulas are set to meet on Sept. 3 to discuss the investigation’s recent findings, address longstanding family feud and the chief executive’s paid leave.
Yogev Toby can be reached at yogev.toby@globe.com.