El Mezquite Market to open next year in South Broadway neighborhood

Frances Armijo said her neighborhood and the surrounding areas, including Barelas and San Jose, need a grocery store after Sol Supermarket closed less than a year ago.

Armijo and neighbor Joseph Garcia, a retired transit supervisor with the city of Albuquerque, might get what they’re asking for. The building that formerly housed Stadium Liquors, a First Choice Community Healthcare clinic and Sol Supermarket is set to receive a big makeover to open another El Mezquite Market, a local grocery store.

Sergio Bermudez, who owns the Mexican-style markets with his brothers across Albuquerque and Los Lunas, completed the purchase of the building over the past few months — buying one side of the building from First Choice in May and in June taking ownership of the other side of the building from Kenny Yoo.

In an interview with the Journal on Monday at the property, known to many neighborhood residents as the Stadium building — it once also housed Stadium Super Market and before that Piggly Wiggly — Bermudez laid out his plans for the location. He said he will make millions of dollars of renovations in the building and parking lot.

That includes, he said, all new electrical and plumbing, a roof and repaving the property’s parking lot.

“Basically what you see right here that we want to use for the shopping center — that’s just a shell,” he said.

Bermudez hopes to open the El Mezquite Market by next summer. He intends to lease the other side of the building, about 6,500 square feet, to a senior clinic or child care facility.

He’s still in the very early stages of development, working through the site designs with Albuquerque-based Modulus Architects & Land Use Planning.

But for Bermudez, the plan to put an El Mezquite at the property has been years in the making. He said he expressed interest to former owner Yoo about acquiring the property for his grocery chain nearly 10 years ago and tried to buy it in March 2023.

“When the day was coming closer, he said, ‘No, you know what? My wife wants to stay one more year,’” he recalled Yoo, who also owned Stadium Liquors that recently closed, saying. “We said, ‘OK.’ But on June 18 we finally closed.”

In putting an El Mezquite at the property, Bermudez will also open the first since 2007 when he and his brothers opened a store at 100 98th NW. El Mezquite has grown to five stores since its founding in 1998. Bermudez’s first location on Isleta Boulevard is still open.

He said once the Broadway location opens, he hopes to hire between 55-60 employees and keep the same traditions of his other stores in offering everything from beer to fresh produce to a wide variety of meats.

That’s welcomed news for Armijo, the president of the South Broadway Neighborhood Association, who said she hopes the store hires local neighborhood residents to work there.

“We need good businesses, and I think this one’s going to help us a lot,” Armijo said.

Garcia, who represents the South Broadway neighborhood on the Rail Yards Market Board of Directors and the Rail Yards Advisory Board for the city, said the area has a high density of elderly residents who could use the convenience of having a grocery store nearby.

But he said the area needs more investment overall, including the addition of more eateries and, stores.

“We need to have more investment,” Garcia said. “When I was growing up, there were quite a few different stores.”

Marcos Gonzales, the economic development director for Bernalillo County, said he had very early discussions — though nothing has been put in writing yet — with Bermudez about industrial revenue bonds for the project, which typically provide property tax abatements for companies looking to expand.

Bermudez said he’s also working with his attorney to see what types of incentives the city may be able to offer for the redevelopment of the property.

Gonzales said an El Mezquite at the site can bode well for the University of New Mexico’s South Campus Tax Increment Development District, which spans some 337 acres and straddles University from Basehart to Gibson.

There, Lobo Development Corp. officials are looking to bring more housing, shopping and dining — last year reaching the sale of two acres of land for $2 million to In-N-Out Burger just west of the fire station on Gibson and Interstate 25.

Gonzales said the TIDD, the plans for El Mezquite and the redevelopment of the bridge on Avenida Dolores Huerta are big wins for the area.

“It is a really great redevelopment story,” Gonzales said. “That area is seeing a renaissance in redevelopment.”