Best of Boulder 2013: Grocery, Natural Foods and Liquor Store

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Hazel\'s Beverage World

Grocery Store

WHOLE FOODS MARKET
2905 Pearl St., 303-545-6611
2584 Baseline Road, 303-499-7636
303 Marshall Road, Superior, 720-274-1415

Second Place: King Soopers
Third Place: Sprouts Farmers Market
Fourth Place: Alfalfa’s Market
Fifth Place: Lucky’s Market

Everyone
knows not to go grocery shopping hungry, lest you return with six
times what you set out to buy. But for those times when you do, Whole Foods Market has a solution.

Showing
up hungry to the expansive Pearl Street location no longer means
walking out with four extra bags. After a quick trip through the store’s
popular food court, shoppers can peruse the store’s aisles without
their empty stomachs making all the calls.

Boulderites
have once again chosen Whole Foods as the best grocery store. The
chain’s focus on natural and organic products no doubt played a role,
and there’s also the surprising selection, as Whole Foods stocks natural
beauty products and offers a massage through Bodywork Bistro at its
Pearl Street location.


Liquor Store

HAZEL’S BEVERAGE WORLD
1955 28th St., 303-447-1955

Second Place: Liquor Mart
Third Place: Superior Liquor
Fourth Place: North Boulder Liquor
Fifth Place: Boulder Wine Merchant

So you decide to grab a six-pack and you whip into Hazel’s Beverage World for
your beer run. Your friends wait in the car. Thirty minutes later, they
decide to go inside to get you. They find you standing in front of the
beer selection with your mouth agape. One of them asks, “What’s taking
so long?” That’s when you tell them that there are 78 glass doors with
beer behind every one. Welcome to Hazel’s, where the amazing selection
that includes more than 12,000 products has been known to derail the
quick stop. Hazel’s is locally owned and calls itself a “Boulder
Original.” And who can argue with a liquor store that boasts the state’s
largest cooler? Our readers were virtually split between Hazel’s and
frequent past winner Liquor Mart, which rolled in at a close second this
year.


Natural Foods

WHOLE FOODS MARKET
2905 Pearl St., Boulder, 303-545-6611
2584 Baseline Road, Boulder, 303-499-7636
303 Marshall Road, Superior, 720-274-1415

Second Place: Vitamin Cottage
Third Place: Alfalfa’s Market
Fourth Place: Sprouts Farmers Market
Fifth Place: Lucky’s Market

If
you’ve ever braved the stretch of Pearl Street between 28th and 30th
streets, especially between, oh, 7 a.m. and 10 p.m., you can’t be
shocked by this result. The turn lane to get into the Whole Foods Market/ Natural
Grocers by Vitamin Cottage parking lot is always packed, Priuses and
Subarus crawling about to get close to the door. As the joke rap song on
YouTube says, it’s getting real in the Whole Foods parking lot.

Boulder
loves its natural foods, and Whole Foods is always pushing the envelope
on that front. That includes taking the sometimes-nebulous “natural”
label and turning it into concrete steps, like Whole Foods’ announcement
in March 2013 that it will be requiring labels on any products
containing GMOs by 2018.