Sprouts Farmers Market to take over a never-opened Amazon Fresh store in Pennsylvania

Sprouts Farmers Market said it is taking over a Pennsylvania grocery space that had been prepared for an Amazon Fresh store but was never opened. The arrangement highlights how Amazon’s retreat from its grocery-store concept is leaving behind commercial real estate that, after long delays, can be repurposed by traditional chains.

According to reporting that the transaction has been in the works, the site is at the Llanerch Shopping Center in Havertown. The store footprint was fully renovated and fitted for an Amazon Fresh concept and later sat unused for more than five years, even as rent was reportedly paid on the space during Amazon’s period of grocery expansion and then pullback.

One outside analysis framed the deal as a lease-transfer story involving a “dark” Amazon Fresh location. It said Amazon had leased the roughly 30,000 square-foot anchor suite, completed a buildout of about $1.7 million, and paid rent for more than five years before the store remained unopened to customers.

The analysis also described how Amazon’s eventual closure of its Amazon Fresh grocery division changed the outlook for the Havertown space. Rather than operating, Amazon and the property’s landlord would have had to negotiate an early exit from the lease. The analysis further noted that the remaining terms appeared to have been resolved through a buyout or termination arrangement.

Sprouts is expected to reopen the location as part of its own footprint. The Business Journals reported Sprouts will open the store as its 13th Philadelphia-area location, with timing described as early 2027. In other words, the “never-opened” Amazon Fresh shell is likely to become an additional physical retail location for Sprouts after years of uncertainty.

The broader implication is that Amazon’s grocery strategy, which included testing and opening neighborhood-format stores under both Amazon Fresh and Whole Foods branding, has been in flux. While Amazon continues to sell groceries and expand related services, it has also trimmed or ended parts of its branded store operations, leaving landlords and tenants to reassign anchor suites.

Still, several important transaction details remain unclear. The publicly available writeups do not fully specify the lease economics (including any termination fees), the exact start date of Sprouts’ occupancy, or whether the transfer includes additional options or rent adjustments. It is also not confirmed in the available material whether Amazon contributed any additional capex recovery beyond the initial buildout, or whether the landlord funded any of the repurposing costs beyond “fully renovated, fitted” preparations.

As Sprouts works toward opening, investors and retailers will likely watch for two indicates: whether this repurposed location becomes a healthy new format for Sprouts in the Philadelphia market, and whether other “dark” or discontinued Amazon grocery sites are similarly reassigned. For Amazon, the case underscores the operational and real-estate consequences of exiting in-flight retail concepts, even after significant buildouts are completed.