Urbandale's New Hy-Vee Store to Be Largest in Metro

By sometime next year, Urbandale will have the largest store in the metro area, said the store's director.

Josh Asche said customers can hardly wait to use the new store. The current store is "bursting at the seams" and needs more room to serve customers.

"So many of the Urbandale customers are so excited about our new expansion and they ask us about it daily," he said.

The 95,000 square-foot store will be built adjacent to the existing store and will be about a third as large. Customers shouldn't experience any inconvenience until the store actually moves its inventory from one building to another.

Asche said he anticipates the store will be closed for about 48 hours, probably closing at 6 p.m. on a Sunday and reopening the following Tuesday.

"We'll have everything we have now, plus," he said, listing these new features:

• A fresh sushi bar
• A sandwich shop
• A larger area for imported and specialty cheeses
• A Caribou Coffee shop
• An oatmeal bar where customers can add any toppings they like to their oatmeal
• A dining area that is twice as large
• A new wine and spirits store
• A stand-alone garden and nursery store
• An outdoor dining patio
• A large club room for community organizations to use and for cooking classes
• A chef's station for education and demonstration will be built into the meat and seafood area
• The bakery department will have an oven specifically designed to bake artisan breads. "That's going to be fantastic," he said.
• The Italian Express will have a wood oven for baking pizza.
• An expanded Health Market with "thousands more items"
• And a greatly expanded organic produce area.

Asche said the store will add about 115 full-time and part-time employees to the 335 people it now employs.

A fuel station will be added after the new store opens he said. The number of parking spaces will double.

Demolition began on the strip west of the store in September and workers currently are grading the site and moving 8,000 truckloads of dirt across Douglas Avenue to fill in land the city owns and eventually hopes will become a pedestrian plaza on the southwest corner of 86th Street and Douglas Avenue.

City Manager A.J. Johnson said the arrangement works well for Hy-Vee and for the city. "These guys need to get rid of the dirt and we need the fill dirt," he said. 

Asche said they hope to have concrete footings and walls  on the new building up within the next month if the weather holds.

The new Douglas Avenue entrance to the store as well as the 86th Street entrance both will remain open for the construction period.

The store will post construction updates on its Facebook page. Customers who "like" the page will be able to get daily construction deals.