Key Food Supermarket

For a small grocery store in NYC, they are great. Relatively low prices. Solid selection. Lowest prices on beer that I have found. It’s not as good as Trader Joe’s but at least it doesn’t have an hour line. Once I bought produce from Key Food that was moldy when I took it out of the packaging. Next time I went back I showed them a picture of the moldy produce and they replaced it no questions asked. It’s 24 hours too, which is niceS

I went to this store several years ago and didn’t like it at that time; the selection wasn’t very good, the employees were unfriendly and the prices were rather high. Today I finally got around to returning and there’s been a significant improvement; the store had been renovated and it’s now very attractive (inside), the selection is much better and the employees were much more pleasant. Some items are still rather high-​priced, however.

I’ve been going to Key Foods for over 10 years and yes the store has improved — but not much. The produce is still not the best and the service is horrific, but it is open 24 hours and if you shop the circular and use your key food card you can save money and get some good deals. If I’m near Union Square I prefer to shop at Trader Joe’s or West Side Market for produce — and if I’m near my place in the East Village Fine Foods on Ave. C and Compare Foods on Ave D have great deals.

For those of you who know what this store was like prior to the renovations, it’s a friggen palace now and much more spacious than it was ;-). Prices are decent, especially meat dept when you catch manager’s specials… Huge deli counter with a wide array of salads and prepared foods in addition to the usual selection of coldcuts. Produce section priced fairly and has decent organic section. For Manhattan it’s not a bad market. Sorry but for all of you complainers go waste your entire paycheck shopping in Whole Foods. I’d rather support a local market that serves the original community, not the hipsters.

Just fine, I suppose, but Manhattan isn’t the place for a Key Food.

Employees are miserable. I have never seen one smile. The aisles are super small and cramped. Older people are mystified that they cannot leave their large carts in the aisle without blocking others. The meat tends to expire quicker than other stores, the prices are all over the place. The lines are disorganized. Home delivery is limited. This place is hell on Earth.

More expensive than wholefoods. Apathetic staff. Cramped aisles. I love Siggi yogurt, but 60 cents more than wholefoods? I think they count on their customers NOT to compare prices. Better shopping experience elsewhere.

This is a surprisingly good store. The produce has been upgraded and is usually
quite fresh. The deli counter is good and most of the folks there are helpful.
Even the meat selection is good. The store’s weekly sales are notable and the
choice of items is excellent. Prices keep going up, but that’s true everywhere. Here at
least one get’s value. I travel from quite a distance.

Overall a decent super market but is a little bit cramped of a store. Its good if you need shopping and a decent place to shop for meat, beer or normal branded goods.
This place has a thorough selection of branded goods at affordable prices, and with the deals that are occasionally run, sometimes great prices. My favorite element though is that they have a strong meat section, selling larger cuts that other supermarkets like Trader Joes or Gristedes shy away from, that are of a good quality and price. They also have a solid selection of branded and somewhat specialty beers at good prices, which is oddly hard to find in a city that is so polarized towards either specialty brands (want that microbrew?) or the plainest of plain only (Budweiser, Coors etc.). Their produce is fairly fresh but not exactly the cheapest or best, but acceptable if you’re getting other things.
The biggest complaint is that the store has odd pricing, sometimes vastly overpricing certain things. While I understand for convenience sake it might be easier to buy all at once, I can’t help but feel a little bit annoyed that they sometimes jack the prices up massively of other things that shouldn’t be that expensive. The structuring of the aisles is also cramped. Its a small store and the goods feel inefficiently placed and ordered.
All in all, a good above average place to shop in a city full of overpriced grocery stores and super deluxe organic to the max places. Its just a normal grocery store that you’d see a lot more in other places that aren’t New York City and fills a certain niche for a good amount of goods.

This store is terrible but the ***FLOWER GUY*** is awesome!
I love having fresh flowers at home, but can’t be spending big bucks every week on flowers, so, I go here! There’s a really nice guy who works from 7am-​7pm, and he will arrange them for you for free. So you pick out what you want and take it to him, then a few minutes later, you walk out with an arrangement that looks like it came from a really nice flower store. No one will know it’s from Key Foods! Our little secret.
My other secret: roses tend to look shabby after a few days. I’d go with something else.
Grocery Store: 0 stars
Flower guy: 5 stars!

If anyone is complaining about this place they should probably take a look at themselves. Can you imagine what this would do to the neighborhood if they were to leave? Can you imagine the logistics of keeping the shelves full? Can you imagine what it is like to be on your feet all day and dealing with complaints from people comparing the store to their super shoprite in Kansas? How a company can keep a store like this as neat as it is and how the company can maintain its commitment to the community to keep a store here in a short building that some developer would love to get its hands on is deserving of nothing but 5 stars from everyone. Come on, put aside your petty complaints and support this local gem 100 percent/

Honestly, I think Keyfood has the best sales but not always the highest quality of food.
I’m solely writing this review as an employee.
This place is super cramped & I wish they’ve done a better job with the renovation honestly. During busy peak hours, 3pm-​8pm, you can barely move in the store & the lines for each register gets completely disorganized & it’s the worst because people love having big shopping carts. All I’m saying is that I wish this store can have the amount of carts it fits & not feel like they’re Fine Fare or Pathmark.
Prices are usually out of wack especially starting every Friday. I would suggest keeping a paper handy & writing down what is on sale in your basket & see if it matches up to the price rung up.
Also can I please just emphasize, READ EVERY LITTLE WORD ON THE SALE TAG. READ THE SALE DATES, THE SIZE YOUR ITEM MUST BE, THE FINE PRINT NOTING IF YOU HAVE TO HAVE A CLUB CARD & WHETHER YOU HAVE TO BUY 2,3 OR IF THERE’S A LIMIT. People tend to overlook it & claim the prices are wrong.
Self checkout is a complete pain in the butt. I definitely don’t recommend using it unless you have 10 items or less. (It runs on Microsoft 2000)
Also, for those wondering why us as cashiers are always so rude is because we receive a whole lot of crap from either the bosses or the customers itself.
Honestly we don’t get paid enough to deal with angry customers & hobos & drunk people. Not to mention on a 15 minute break.
BTW, we have two price scanner if you’re not sure of it. Right by the beer & right by the freezer aisle near the organic frozen food.

Some of the rudest people I have struck in NYC work here.
The selection is limited.
The store is cramped.

Honestly, the only good thing about this supermarket is that it’s open 24 hours. Other than that, it’s a complete mess. I come here almost every week, and can rarely find everything I need. The produce isn’t very fresh so I generally have to rely on fruit stands for fruits and vegetables.
Even though it seems like the cheapest option in the area, I still have to go to Trade Joe’s to get some of my groceries because some things are overpriced at Key Foods. Also, the produce aisle is never organized – the prices are almost never displayed so I always have to track down an employee to tell me how much the sweet potatoes or butternut squash is. They do have weekly deals that are sometimes pretty good so that’s a plus.
The checkout is an absolute nightmare. The store isn’t big enough, so there isn’t enough room for the checkout lines so people are always pushing through with grocery carts and when it is your turn to checkout you only have about 5 seconds to put all of your groceries on the register before you start getting dirty looks and hearing loud sighs.
If at all possible, go somewhere else. If you do have to come here, use the produce the same day you buy it and look at their weekly deals before you checkout.

Definitely avoid this place if you have a choice, but being that sometimes I need to get something in the middle of the night this place is really my last resort. The shelves always look barren when I go, but then again its usually after the sale period and everything on the shelves are gone. Hence it really defeats the purpose of even coming here.
There are so many other alternatives to this key food, come here if you want to dig around and look for what you want because its usually impossible to find.

I love that key food is right around the corner. They revamped all the shelves, you can find almost anything here. Just beware the lines gets really long around 6 and 7. Also if you order anything from boarhead the line gets super long.

Key foods is my go-​to market in my neighborhood. Really reasonable prices for the most part and a pretty decent selection.
Only issues I have with them:
1. The freshness of the prepared foods is questionable– I once saw them hosing out the inside of the prepared foods case while most of the food was still in it. The dirty water was splashing all over the other salads
2. The prepared foods are really oily
3. The customer service is miserable. Everyone looks so unhappy

Being new to the city, I was dying to find an actual grocery store that is not a Trader Joes or the high priced Whole Foods. Key Foods is A-​Ok in my book!
Positives:
Great Prices
Convenient
Beer Selection
The customer service could be a little better, and the lines are always long… but other than it is a reliable place :-)

This Key Foods could use a makeover but unlikely given it’s location. It’s super convenient for me and I get a lot of basics or big name brand items at decent prices. Plus it’s open 24 hours.
They even surprise me from time to time with items they carry… over Thanksgiving weekend, I found kale.
But definitely don’t go here expecting good service because you ain’t gonna find it. Even expect your groceries to be thrown into your bags, especially if you bring your own.
I’m all about self-​check out, but they have the worst ones. Really loud, very slow, and always requires someone to come assist b/​c I scanned too fast, or the weight sensor thinks I put in something I didn’t.
And if you’re into getting your bottle deposits back, they have bottle machines outside on 4^th St. if you’re willing to battle it out with the older Asian folk.

«DUDE. There’s a bitchfight going on in Aisle 6!»
That’s what the giddy guy in his forties (who we didn’t know) came over to our aisle to tell us. Some woman had dared to go into the 20 Items or Less* line with 30 items, and the cashier freaked out on her.
The entire store stopped and watched as the customer was saying, «Muck me? Muck YOU!» And the cashier just kept saying, «Muck yourself. Muck yourself. Muck yourself. MUCK YOURSELF!”** Until she got taken away by the manager.
So don’t go in the express lanes here with too many items, if you can help it.
Overall though, this Key Food is decent. It’s head and shoulders above the Fine Fare on Ave C, but it’s fairly cramped and the selection can be limited.
Don’t go in expecting to buy anything organic for instance. It’s just not going to happen. Regular chicken breast: $ 3/​lb. Organic? $ 13/​lb. Who is going to buy that when they’re side by side? Also, you can get the deli meats at about $ 1/​lb. cheaper at Gracefully, a block south.
On the plus side, produce is usually fine, they occasionally have the cut of meat I’m looking for, and they stock some dynamite challah rolls for sandwiches. But if I’m ever here, it’s because of where it is, not what it is.
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*Shouldn’t it be 20 Items or Fewer? Don’t you like me just a little bit less for pointing this out?
**They didn’t really say muck.