Japanese grocer Hashi Market leased a 35,715-square-foot retail unit in North Seattle to open its first location in the city.

The store occupies space at 13025 Aurora Avenue N previously run by Amazon Fresh. The site became available after Amazon closed its Fresh- and Go-branded brick-and-mortar grocery stores nationwide earlier this year.

Hashi Market plans to stock fresh Japanese produce, packaged groceries, and home goods across the single-level footprint. The North Seattle format will also run on-site catering services alongside dedicated sections for beauty products and household essentials.

Taking over built-out supermarket real estate reduces upfront capital spending on refrigeration and distribution fixtures. Former Amazon Fresh properties feature heavy electrical infrastructure, cold storage rooms, and loading docks that grocery operators can repurpose without full structural refits.

Amazon spent years testing automated checkouts and custom grocery layouts before shuttering dozens of Go and Fresh units across US metropolitan markets. That retrenchment opened suburban strip-centre boxes to specialty food operators hunting for turnkey retail space.

Asian grocery chains have expanded steadily into North American secondary and primary corridors, filling mid-sized footprints between 30,000 and 50,000 square feet. Hashi Market steps into a corridor where demographic demand for imported Japanese pantry staples, prepared foods, and cosmetics remains underserved by traditional supermarkets.

Specialty grocers benefit from higher basket sizes and stronger customer retention than conventional general merchandisers in competitive metro areas. Asian supermarket operators often rely on extensive fresh counters, hot meal programs, and imported stock keeping units that conventional chains do not carry.

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