SANTA MARIA - It's the biggest and newest strip mall in Santa Maria.
When completed, the nearly block-long shopping center on Blosser Road will be home to the second Walmart Neighborhood Market in town.
It will bring to about a dozen the number of supermarkets or large grocery stores in the city of Santa Maria.
"It does seem like quite a few markets", says local resident Bud Kelley who knows he now has a plethora of places to buy groceries in Santa Maria.
From the largest national chains and big box stores to the niche markets and what's left of the smaller, independent grocer.
But can they all survive in a city of 100,000 people?
"I like competition, the more the merrier as far as I'm concerned", Bud Kelley says.
"Yeah, depending on the location and the convenience I think", says local shopper Alecia Libby.
"I wouldn't want to see anymore come in because it would make it harder for the other stores", says local shopper Jeannette Tennyson, "I think we have enough right now as it is."
"You got Walmart dropping stores on top of stores on top of stores and they're even predatory on their own market share", says John Spencer who owns the independent Spencer's fresh markets.
Spencer has seen the local grocery business change dramatically since he started in 1971.
"The industry was driven by local food stores and now its sort of a predatory business, big chain environments, and everybody wants to be in the food business", Spencer says.
"There is probably going to come a breaking point, where, and I hope it's the small businesses like ours, and so many of them we grew up with around here", Spencer says, "that keep hanging in there, I think we're a vital part of it."
