Fairway Market

I came in an hour before closing and whizzed through the aisles to get my necessities. I wanted to get the San Pellegrino blood orange soda and asked a guy who was nearby restocking soda if it was still on sale. He didn’t bother to look for the named product and told me the cashier would know. I brought the items in my basket to the check out and asked the cashier if she knew if the SP blood orange soda was n sale but she said she needed to see the soda in order to let me know. She asked a co-​worker who may have even been the manager to go get a 6 pack. The manager appeared perturbed to have to go get it for me. She comes back and throws down plastic bottles of mandarin orange flavored seltzer water and declared they don’t have any blood orange soda, only what she brought me. I told her it was not what I wanted and it was definitely there in cans. She stormed off and took a long time to come back. I almost gave up seeing the line waiting behind me to check out as it was almost closing time. When she finally returned she seemed even more annoyed, left the 6-​pack on the conveyer belt, turned and huffed off. My simple question seemed to be an ordeal for this crew. Had I not waited as long as I did, I would’ve just said to forget it just based on the indignant look this manager gave me. I was at Whole Foods earlier in the day and by comparison, this 2^nd Avenue Fairway is a far cry from the cleaner, more organized and friendlier WF. The end of the day is not the time to ask this staff an easy question of whether something was on sale because in the sequence of each person’s response they either a) don’t know and are not willing to go find out for you b) can’t help you unless she has the physical specimen in front of her to scan (guess there is no flyer or list of sale items from which the cashier could refer or c) been the unfortunate one to have been asked to get the item and bring it to the cashier and customer and you make sure by your face and grunts how put off you are to help out. I will come here only out of necessity and not for their customer service. The employees are not concerned with losing the sale or worse yet, losing a customer. I would even forgive the end of the day staleness of the prepared food which was the primary reason I came in but decided not to risk eating any old food. The staff is not glad to see you at the end of their long day so keep your questions to yourself! Don’t expect helpfulness and useful/​accurate information either.

Fairway is the best market in the area, hands down. There’s an endless supply of produce and everything is always super fresh. I love how much they have to offer and how many different brands there are to try — I always finding myself wanting to try something new. The meat and fish counters are awesome there’s a lot to pick from. I love the different flavors of marinated chicken — they’re all delicious.
The staff is extremely friendly and helpful and the store is always clean and neat. Even when lines get long at the registers it never ends up being more than a few minutes of a wait.

Fairway claims to make all prepared foods on Premises (posted on bold signs):
However, they do NOT! I spoke with the store manager who admitted that almost all the food is made offsite and brought in every other day — so not as fresh as they claim.
What bothers me is how Fairway posts LARGE signs with blatant printed lies. Lies that you have to discover on your own after investigation (such as the amount of cheese they claim in import).
What else are they lying about?!? Who knows!

Good selection. Prepackaged food is alright. The gourmet cookies go well at work! Make friends, buy cookies. Give them salad, make enemies.

Aside from a small street-​level entrance, this Fairway Market is below ground. Unfortunately, only one of their two escalators was functioning on our last visit (they also have a large glass elevator), which contributed to the lack-​luster appearance of the place. They do pack a lot of groceries and specialty goods into this store given the increasingly expensive neighborhood, and although if you shop with restraint you can find some reasonable prices (we bought exactly one loaf of fresh brioche from the bakery counter before checking-​out and it was a good buy!), this isn’t a store at which we’d do general grocery shopping.

So happy we have fairway in this area! Selection is great, lines can get huge at times but move fairly quick! Staff are nice

I go out of my way to do my grocery shopping here. The grocery store has great lighting, great inventory and is extremely large. My only complaints are that it gets very crowded, but the lines move quickly so I don’t mind too much and also the inventory is scattered (i.e. flavored waters in 3 different aisles.) This makes it hard to find everything as quickly as I would like to. But compared to other NYC grocery stores, this place is a gem.

Unfortunately Fairway on 30^th & Second have gone down since they first arrived to our neighborhood. We were so excited when they first arrived — as our choices were limited within the immediate vicinity.
Biggest problem is the lack of customer service and the «mistakes» made when charging items such as produce. And when you point it out, they won’t make the change at the cashier, where you are currently standing — no, you have to go to customer service. If you are lucky, there is no line. If there is a line, take your turn. C/​service is none too happy to see you. And when they feel like it, they will make the call to the produce dept. to check what you said was correct. Then, without an apology, they will give you your money back. Since a lot of people shopping there are yuppies, they know they can get away with this, since a lot of them don’t check the receipt. This has happened 3 weeks in a row !! Something is rotten in the state of Denmark!
I have emailed three times to complain about this situation, and got a standard:
Dear Valued Customer,
Thank you for writing us with your question or concern regarding Fairway Market, our service, and our products. Your message has been sent to our Customer Relations Team. We appreciate you taking the time to reach out to us, and we are already working to address your issue. Please allow us 24 to 72 hours to resolve your concerns and respond to you.
And then nothing. BLACK HOLE.
There are some really good things about Fairways — I like their bread & fish/​meat dept. And the produce dept has some good items. Also relatively easy to return any empty bottles. Their prepared food section is a bit of a joke though (nothing like Wholefoods). Not always easy to find items, as similar types of things can be easily split over several aisles.
CAN’T WAIT until Trader Joe’s goes in 2016 !! Fairway could take a leaf (NO, A CHAPTER!!) out of customer service from Trader Joe’s. And once they go in, my forays to Fairway will be severely curtailed.

This supermarket started out great but after a couple of years it has gone markedly downhill.
The wait times have become longer as very few of the registers actually have cashiers behind them and the restocking can leave a lot to be desired at times.
The biggest decline is witnessed in their hot buffet bar, it went from great to pathetic… I mean seriously little to choose from these days and what there is looks pretty unappetizing.
All in all a store that had great promise which has now become mediocre.

Not the cheapest option for grocery shopping in NY (cough Trader joes cough cough).
It has all the normal type food though, aka Special K cereal, which TJ doesn’t have.
They have an extensive meat/​butcher area and they do have some things you can buy by the pound. (The tricolor quinoa comes at a great price, ~3 cups dry quinoa for $ 3.50).
The aisles aren’t set up methodically, you have to kind of wander around to find things, but there are a lot of salespeople mulling around who want to help.
In the butcher area though, there’s not great options for raw chicken, like why is everything sold in such large quantities, I don’t want $ 20 worth of chicken hanging around my apartment.

While I still prefer the Fairway Market in Harlem, I really like this one too.
This Fairway lacks two things that the one in Harlem has: 1 – this Fairway has no parking lot, and 2 – There is no cold room in this Fairway (I really like the cold room! :-)).
That being said, this Fairway still has many things going for it. It has the same great products. The olive bar here is wonderful too. It is also less maze-​like than the Fairway in Harlem, and the one in the Upper West Side, with wider aisles.
This Fairway is also more convenient to public transportation, with the 2^nd and 3^rd Avenue buses a short walk away. It’s also closer to my work, so I may come here more often.
It is close to the NYU hospital, and the last time I visited was around 5:30. It was crowded with many people wearing scrubs. Like me, they had just got off work and were getting groceries on the way home. The line was long, but it moved quickly. It wasn’t bad, but you may want to come during a less busy time.

This place reminds me a lot do whole foods, just maybe not quite as aesthetically pleasing. The fruit selection is particularly massive. Everything in this market looks fresh and delicious. My friend loves buying the bread here because it’s made without any preservatives. The water bottles here are super cheap! I got a single one for $ 0.69!

Oh man I never thought I would write a review for a grocery store but something about my mood today has really inspired me.
Basically there are two things you need to know about this place:
1. It is absolutely the most confusing place in the entire world. There are about 3 different aisles that have crackers and cereal on them and I really just wish they would keep all the cereal together.
2. They do have a fine selection of cheese and I love me some cheese
In conclusion, here are directions to the cheese: Take the escalator down and walk in a straight line to the back of the store and there you have it. No idea where on earth you can find the crackers to accompany it though, so good luck with the rest of your shopping!

Let’s cut to the chase.
Price: somewhere in between Whole Foods aka Whole Paycheck and Trader Joe’s
Pros:
–Large selection of food. Unlike TJ and Whole Paycheck where they have other brands, you can get normal brands like Oreos and Ritz Crackers here. They do offer their own store brand of food.
–If you are eating into organic foods, they have a pretty good selection.
–There is an escalator and an elevator to take you downstairs. The grocery store is located one floor below ground level.
–The lines for the cashier aren’t insane. And there is no line to go in. Sorry Trader Joe’s, your lines drive me nuts.
–The aisles are not crammed. Its wide enough.
–The food is here fresh. Unlike food emporium which sells rotten food, this place does not. You can buy vegetables and they will not go bad the next day.
–Good selection of fish and meat.
Cons:
–Prices are ok. Not as cheap as I had hoped for but its totally worth paying a little more so I don’t have to feel like I am going to world war 3.

Am I the only person who finds this place overrated?
Yes I get that the selection is much more than you can find other places, but the prices are not that competitive to the other places I have looked at.
Oh well. It’s kind of far for me anyways so I won’t be going back.

PROS:
— Large selection on drinks (hard to find drinks) e.g. Rekorderlig Pear Cider & Belvoir Pomegranate and Raspberry/​Lime Lemon flavors.
EH:
— Hot food $ 8.49 a lb. The fish was not good — super dry. Shrimp and broccoli was ehhh. like it was baked from a school cafeteria. I will be going elsewhere for hot food.

Like a hybrid of a Whole Foods, a Trader Joe’s, & a big supermarket.
Good:
1– Wide Selection & includes both cheap (e.g. Salmon) & pricey Caviar, Tripe, Bone Marrow, & good smelly cheeses.
2-​Some specialty items like various Jamons. Like the $ 199 a pound Iberico Jamon, which price reflects the unique porkers in Spain who only eat acorns. Does it taste better & more tender than others… yep! But it is a pricey luxury which is generally almost impossible to find in most of California… nor was I aware of it back in early NYC years.
3-​Good selection of various veges & fruits, but you can tell they were picked unripened, & then artificially ripened (e.g. Ethylene Oxide ?)
4-​Bread are diverse & have a nice crunch… but they seem to run out of Rye Bread too easily.
Bad:
1– Nowhere as good selection nor freshness as in many coastal California stores, especially since they are either grown there, or in nearby Mexico.
2– Does not come anywhere near most of the fresh Farmer’s Markets in CA & elsewhere.
3– Staff in general seems underpaid & not too knowledgable.
4-​Like a big box store, but big prices.
5– Cheese selection is not diverse enough.
In summary, after being spoiled by California fresh food, this place underwhelms me, but I imagine it is great for local denizens… especially after they paid their mortgage on million dollar apartments.
Fairway also came in handy for my NYC visit, since it was between NYU Medical Center (where I was a health care proxy for my very sick mom) & the Hyatt Herald Square (my room had a small frig for snacks).

Mein Lieblings Market in New York. Sehr vielfältig, sehr gute Fleischabteilung und Fairwaykaffee in 80 Sorten. Typisch amerikanisch freundlich, entspannt und auch noch gute Preise. Es gibt nichts, was man dort nicht kaufen kann. Und wenn es mal nicht da ist, besorgen sie es schnellstmöglich.

This review is for the Fairway bakery only and unfortunately, Fairway, when you mess with my dessert on a major holiday, you will be the recipient of review apocalypse.
I was the happy recipient to be gifted with a strawberry rhubarb pie for Thanksgiving. Two solid pounds of Bread Alone yumminess. The family ate our meal, then salivated over the pie… until we sliced it. The actual thing was decomposing! The strawberries were turning a creamy pink the rhubarb was grey, and there was a creamy slightly neon pink cream on the inside. Eeck! My sisters were so skeeved out. Hesitant to throw out a two lb pie, I cautiously took a few nibbles of the fruit, decided that dying of food poisoning on Thanksgiving wasn’t a fun family thing to do, and tossed the pie. I still paid for it later with an upset stomach. If sis hadn’t made guava empanadas, I would have had more than a stomach ache.
So Fairway, get your game up or shut your bakeds good area. Because when I called my friend who had given me the pie, she said hers was undercooked! Our pie had mold on the crust which my hawkeye sis caught and my Bff’s pie had to be recooked? Then earlier in the year, I had been gifted with the Fairway version of Cronuts. The only outstanding thing about them was the piece of plastic sis found in one! What’s up with this Kip’s Bay Fairway? What’s with the bakery in general? The 6^th Avenue one told me they refrigerated their challah! I refrigerate bread when I toast it or want it stale for French toast!
To be fair to Fairway, I must say their customer service is excellent. When sis complained about the plastic and sent them a photo, they sent her a coupon for more cronuts and a gift card. She’s used the gift card but was still too traumatized to get more cronuts (the flavors were meh at best anyway). I don’t know if my friend complained as I suggested she do since I sent her pics of the moldy, decomposing pie. But Fairway seems quite responsive to complaints.
So Fairway, try putting freshness dates on your baked goods, freeze your breads if you have to, not refrigerate them, and instill better quality control. Because you have been dropped from my Thankgiving dessert menu but I would like in the future to try your other baked good again on a non-​holiday.

So at first, I wasn’t about the fairway life. I crinkled & turned up my nose cause I was not a fan of the name.
Yet, I was curious one day as I walked by it & decided to go back & see what it was about.
The game switched up on me.
I’ve been a few times and they seem to carry the rare, hard-​to-​find flavors of certain products within the bolthouse & red jacket orchards brands. Also, they have certain hard-​to-​find bread, yogurt, and OMG… Sarabeth preserves.
WHAT.
That’s ‘Jizz in my pants’ status right there.
And the people shopping in here have sanity and manners. Crazy Trader Joe’s customers (which accounts for 80% of them, can’t lie) could sure as hell learn a thing or ten…
Soooo…fairway is awesome. They always have sample stations of some sort in the store too. That’s comforting & appetite pleasing.
Fairway, you won my heart.

Huge supermarket! Located in Kips Bay, this large supermarket is on Second Avenue and E. 30^th street. As soon as you walk in, there’s a bar that sells coffee and a few items.
Down the escalator, you are able to view the entire grocery store. Many supermarkets such as Gristedes, Food Emporium, and Whole Foods are their competition.
So I decide to check out the place. As soon as you arrive downstairs, you are in the produce department. I’d recommend people to but the loose fruits and vegetables, not the ones already cut up or separated in cups. They looked absolutely disgusting. Green grapes are $ 3.99/lb and Cilantro is $ 1.99. Eh, okay due to the area. It’s about a dollar more compared to Brooklyn.
I walked around. A bottle of Francesco Rinaldi’s Sweet&Zesty pasta sauce was $ 2.19. Organic Whole Wheat pasta was $ 1.89. Organic grass fed ground beef is $ 8.99. Uh yeah, I’m not spending almost $ 15 just to make one dish.
They also have a hot bar. They sell seafood too. The deli department cuts your charcuterie anyway you want, depending on how many pounds you want.
They also sell their own coffee. From French Vanilla, to Colombian, to Kenyan, to Hazelnut Chocolate, to Chocolate, to French Vanilla Hazelnut. They smell delightful. They usually sell for $ 7.99 and up.
Going on, the lines were way too long. I decided to leave. There’s nothing really special about this place. It’s overpriced due to location. Other than that, it was okay. I might only come back for their French Vanilla coffee beans.