Amazon announced it would be opening a new grocery store in California as the company looks to expand into the grocery market beyond its purchase of Whole Foods.
“Amazon is opening a grocery store in Woodland Hills in 2020,” a representative for the company told CNET on Monday. The company said the store would differ from Whole Foods but did not expand on its prices or offerings.
The grocery store is being heralded as “Amazon’s first grocery store,” according to job listings. In 2017, Amazon purchased Whole Foods for $13 billion and has used the grocery chain as a launchpad to expand into the industry and offer grocery home deliveries.
The continued expansion into the market was rumored back in March but was not confirmed by the company until today. The company’s plan is to open dozens of stores in major U.S. cities with the first being built in California.
“Amazon flexing its muscles in the broader grocery space poses a threat to traditional food retailers,” Brian Nowak, a New York analyst at Morgan Stanley, said back in March. “It now seems the Whole Foods acquisition was a shot across the bow, which enabled Amazon to learn the ins and outs of physical grocery retail.”
