Roswell grocery store chain moving into Portales

PORTALES — With a new year comes a new grocery outlet for Portales, bringing with it plans for a large-scale tortilla factory, a bakery and a pharmacy.

Farmers Country Market, a chain of grocery stores based out of Roswell, purchased Portales grocer Russell’s SuperSave’s location on West 18th Street, which had been in operation for 14 years.

Tim Russell, owner and general manager of SuperSave, said that he plans to take a break from working and “see which way the Lord takes us.”

“It’s been a fun ride,” he said. “The part I enjoyed the most after moving to Portales was meeting all the people in Portales. I have accumulated a great many friendships, so that’s probably the best part.”

According to General Manager Robert Garcia, the store’s first day as Farmers Country Market was Friday and will be the first of many in which the company will espouse “hometown” values.

“We’re proud to be a part of Portales, New Mexico, and we are still homegrown, hometown kind of people. We’re not a big chain that will forget about our customers,” he said. “We’re all about customer service, freshness, quality. We hope people come in here, and they find the freshest produce and the best meats in town.”

The store will be undergoing a myriad of changes aimed at improving the customer’s experience, Garcia said.

“Our plans are to put in a big tortilla factory. We’re now operating on a small one. The full size tortilla factory will have not just tortillas, but it will have corn, it will have tostada chips, it will have taco shells, it will have salad bowls, etc., manufactured at the tortilla factory,” he said, adding that a bakery that makes everything “from scratch” is also in the works.

“The tortilla factory — we’re hoping to have it up and running within 30-60 days. The bakery part, we’re hoping in at least 60 days, will be in full operation,” he said.

Other changes include cosmetic work and a new storefront sign, as well as the addition of a pharmacy.

“We currently own 14 stores, and half of them have pharmacies. We’re hoping within 90 days to have a pharmacist in line and definitely have a place for them in this large structure we have now,” Garcia said.

Russell credited his employees with making his 14 years in Portales enjoyable.

“We’ve been very, very blessed to have the employees we did. Without employees, you can’t have a business, and I feel very grateful for all my employees,” said Russell. “They (Farmers Country Market) will be taking all of our employees aboard, and they all will be at the rate of pay that they had already been at. We made sure that our employees were taken care of in the transaction, so that made us feel real good, that the other company was willing to do that.”