Kroger has opened a 57,000-square-foot fulfillment center in Johnstown as part of its efforts to expand grocery delivery service in northern Colorado, one of the state’s fastest-growing regions.
The facility is in an industrial park along U.S. 34 and will work in conjunction with Kroger’s fulfillment center in Aurora. The center, which opened in September, has nearly 70 employees, Kroger said in a statement.
Kroger, parent company of King Soopers, called the Johnstown center a spoke that will serve as a kind of delivery hub for customers throughout the region. The center will bring Kroger’s vast selection of items right to customers’ doorsteps, said Rebekah Manis, senior director of the grocery chain’s delivery fulfillment centers.
“This facility will meet the needs of both our community and the immediate surrounding area,” said Matt LeCerf, town manager of Johnstown.
The new grocery delivery facility should increase service and facilitate greater access to groceries for Johnstown and area residents with transportation challenges, town officials said. Johnstown worked with Kroger, the Larimer County Office of Economic and Workforce Development and other regional partners to bring the fulfillment center to the area.
Employees at Kroger’s center in Aurora will assemble orders and place them in climate-controlled vehicles to travel to Johnstown. Once the orders arrive, they are checked and placed on refrigerated delivery trucks that take them directly to customers.
Kroger has nine fulfillment centers across the country and plans more. The new center in northern Colorado is one of the latest signs of the area’s continuing growth. The grocery giant is working with the technology company Ocado Group to expand into the area.
The region was the fastest-growing in Colorado between 2010 and 2020, according to the state demographer’s office. Larimer and Weld counties combined grew 24.6%, compared to the statewide rate of 14.8%.
In Johnstown, about 47 miles north of Denver, hundreds of housing units are being built or are in the planning stages. The 200-acre Ledge Rock mixed-use project just east of Interstate 25 will include about 1 million square feet of retail space.
Across the highway from Ledge Rock, Colorado’s first Buc-ee’s is taking shape. The Texas-based company is building a travel center that will have a 74,000-square-foot convenience store and 120 gas pumps.
Johnstown spokesman Sean Kennedy said the town expects Buc-ee’s to open sometime in the second quarter of 2024.
