Tacoma Is Losing One of Its Two Fred Meyer Stores

West Tacoma is about to lose one of its largest grocery stores.

Fred Meyer confirmed Friday that it plans to close its James Center store at 6901 S. 19th St., leaving the company with just one Fred Meyer location inside Tacoma city limits. The company has not yet publicly announced an official closing date.

For people who live in West Tacoma, this is considerably more than the disappearance of another retail storefront.

The James Center Fred Meyer is a full-service grocery store with a pharmacy, bakery, deli, meat department, floral department, money services, pickup service and other everyday necessities. It has long served residents around the western end of South 19th Street, including nearby neighborhoods and the growing residential areas surrounding James Center.

Fred Meyer said that the company made the “difficult decision” after what it described as a careful evaluation of the store.

The company did not provide a more specific reason for closing the James Center location.

Once it closes, Tacoma’s remaining Fred Meyer will be the larger Tacoma-Stevens store at 4505 S. 19th St.

Fred Meyer also pointed customers toward its University Place Fred Meyer and QFC stores in Parkland and Northeast Tacoma.

That may sound relatively straightforward on a map.

For customers without cars, however, losing a neighborhood grocery store can be considerably more disruptive.

The closure will directly affect approximately 100 unionized employees, according to UFCW Local 367, which represents workers at the James Center store.

The union sharply criticized Fred Meyer’s decision Friday and said it plans to bargain with the company over how the closure will affect employees.

Among its priorities are making transfers to other stores realistically accessible and protecting workers’ wages and accrued benefits.

The union also argues that the store has served as an important economic anchor for James Center.

Large grocery stores generate a steady stream of customers, and those shoppers can spill over into surrounding restaurants, shops and services. UFCW says neighboring small businesses could therefore feel the effects of the closure as well.

That’s the strongest claim being made about the closure — and one worth putting in context.

UFCW Local 367 says losing Fred Meyer “threatens to turn West Tacoma into an immediate food desert,” particularly affecting seniors, lower-income residents and households that depend on public transportation.

There are other grocery options in and around West Tacoma, so whether the neighborhood technically meets a particular definition of a food desert will depend on geography, transportation and how the term is defined.

But the larger point is difficult to dispute: a major full-service grocery store is disappearing from a part of Tacoma where thousands of people have relied on it.

And groceries are only part of the equation.

The James Center store also operates a pharmacy, meaning customers who have prescriptions there will eventually need to transfer them elsewhere.

Fred Meyer currently lists two Tacoma grocery stores: James Center and Tacoma-Stevens.

After James Center closes, only the Stevens location will remain.

That makes this closure more noticeable than the loss of a single location in a market saturated with stores from the same chain.

Fred Meyer has been part of the Tacoma retail landscape for decades, and the James Center store occupies a particularly visible location near the intersection of South 19th Street and Mildred Street.

For many West Tacoma residents, it has simply been their Fred Meyer.

Now they’ll need a new grocery store, a new pharmacy — or both.

And the roughly 100 people who work there are waiting to learn what comes next.

Fred Meyer has not yet announced when the doors will close for the final time.

Read UFCW Local 367’s statement on the closure here.