New KCK grocery store gets green light to replace old one: ‘Reflect the community’
Wyandotte County commissioners moved forward plans to replace a downtown Kansas City, Kansas, grocery store that closed last year.
Commissioners during a public meeting last week approved a letter of intent from Anthony Estrada of Santa Fe Grocers LLC to open a new, local market where the Merc Co+op once operated.
Estrada, who has local ties to KCK, is also behind the reopening of a grocery store in place of a former Sun Fresh Market off Kansas City, Missouri’s, Prospect Avenue. That store is scheduled to open in mid-May, he told The Star.
Should negotiations with the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and KCK progress, both the KCK and Prospect grocers would be managed by Estrada and his team under the name United Market. He hopes the locations will operate as sibling stores that can share resources as needed.
Before the commission’s vote, Estrada told The Star he was feeling nervous but that he knew he had been as honest as he could throughout the process of pitching the store to officials. His letter of intent had passed the government’s Economic Development and Finance Committee just days before.
Although negotiations on a management agreement between the Unified Government and Estrada will continue, an approved letter of intent means that Estrada can start ordering equipment and gain access to the store to determine what projects to start with.
He’s proposed a half-million-dollar redevelopment plan that he hopes would maximize the amount of baked goods, meat, dairy and produce options available for downtown residents.
And those items will be priced based on income levels in the neighborhood surrounding the 501 Minnesota Ave. location, he said.
“We want the store to reflect the community,” Estrada said. The KC native has been pushing grocery carts since he was 16 years old, and has since worked in every grocery department. He entered store management at 19, and has helped other local grocers open and operate stores around the area.
Everything he’s done in his career has led him to this moment, he told The Star.
If successful, the new store would replace The Merc Co+op, a locally owned market that’s connected to the National Co+op Grocers group. The store closed at the end of 2025, just five years after opening, due to financial sustainability concerns. The store cost more than $7 million in public funds and tax credits to construct.
The building is still primed to be set up as a grocery store, with cooling sections, carts and shelves ready for use.
This story was originally published April 6, 2026 at 2:10 PM.
