World Fresh Market broadens reach with diverse ethnic offerings

World Fresh Market is reshaping Kansas City’s grocery landscape by introducing a broader spectrum of ethnic produce tailored to the city’s diverse population.

Building on the success of its five Hispanic-focused supermarkets, El Mercado Fresco, the company launched World Fresh Market in Overland Park, Kan. The venture is intended to reach an even broader audience by incorporating ethnic varieties of food that resonate with the city’s diverse communities.

At the core of World Fresh Market’s mission is a commitment to diversity, says Sarah Saber, operations manager for El Mercado Fresco — not only in the products on its shelves, but also in its sourcing strategies. By combining local and international sourcing, the store supports regional farmers while bringing unique and exotic produce to its customers and ensuring that customers have access to knowledgeable staff who can help them explore new food options.

Serving the needs of a diverse community

Eddie Musallet owns seven open and operating retail supermarkets, including El Mercado Fresco and World Fresh Market.

“Our DBA in most of our stores is El Mercado Fresco,” Saber said. “The idea for World Fresh Market came from our history and what we excel at, which is Latinx supermarkets. A lot of our supermarkets are located throughout the Kansas City metro in very diverse neighborhoods. We noticed within the past seven years that there are a lot of new [immigrants] to this country, and they’re not necessarily Hispanic. This led us to focus on more diverse supermarket options.”

While El Mercado Fresco supermarkets have a Hispanic food focus, Saber says the stores were seeing customers from Syria, Iraq, Iran and Africa, as well as other countries.

“We wanted to diversify, so we started incorporating more of the products that they wanted to see,” Saber said. “We excel in Hispanic foods, but we wanted to diversify and cater to all communities.”

With this goal in mind, Saber said when the nearly 45,000-square-foot Overland Park location became available to lease, Musallet knew it was perfect for World Fresh Market.

“His vision is pretty amazing. We call it ‘the world under one roof,’” Saber said. “We do so because you have multiple walks of life and different ethnic backgrounds all under one roof, which can be difficult to cater to since we’re trying to represent a little over 30 countries. When you think about 30, that’s a lot, but it doesn’t even touch the surface of how many countries there are in this world — and how every country truly eats differently, whether it’s shelf-stable to produce, meats and seafood.”

Saber says it’s important to cater to the customers but also to educate customers who might be unfamiliar with certain produce.

“Customers might be hesitant to try something new to them, so I’m always asking them if they need assistance,” Saber said. “All of the teammates work to help customers. And we have over 15 languages spoken among our staff, so it’s awesome to have that diversity on staff, and they’re able to communicate with someone who might be hesitant to try something.”

A varied produce section

Saber says the produce department at World Fresh Market is unlike traditional supermarkets.

“It’s completely different than other produce sections in the area. … You won’t find such a broad range of, for example, Asian produce at traditional supermarkets. Or if another store carries a similar item, they may only have it in one size whereas we have a variety of options,” said Saber, who added that while some supermarkets may only carry one or two varieties of mangoes, for example, World Fresh Market keeps several.

The supermarket tries to balance local with international produce selections.

“We’re big on supporting local farmers. Especially now, with so much in season, we’re going at least once or twice a week to pick up locally grown watermelon, cantaloupes, bell peppers, tomatoes and so on,” Saber said. “It’s something that we want to do, because at the end of the day, we are a local business. We want to support other local businesses, and if that’s a means of doing so, we’re going to do it.”

To offer a diverse selection of produce, World Fresh Market sources produce from around the world.

“It all comes down to serving the diverse needs of our customers,” Saber said. “If a customer wants it, we will try to bring it in. It’s that simple.”

A broad range of products

In addition to the massive produce section, the store has a made-from-scratch bakery, food stands selling prepared foods such as falafel, roasted-in-house nuts, juices or pocket sandwiches.

Organizing the aisles, with so many ethnic foods, was a challenge during construction.

“Trying to decide what departments would go where became difficult. How do you incorporate the Middle East, for example?” Saber said. “We have a designated aisle for those food items but there are so many crossover items. So, we decided it made more sense to have a bean isle rather than having different beans located in different aisles.

“To make it less confusing, we decided to scale back, or we would run out of space,” Saber continued. “So, the first six aisles are international, then the rest is a typical grocery store, because we want the customer to come in for specialty items, but also to purchase their milk or eggs or cereal.

“At the end of the day, our goal is to make the community happy and be able to grow from that,” Saber added. “We’re offering unique products in one place — items you might not find at other grocers such as our aisles of packaged foods, elaborate produce section, a scratch bakery, authentically made tres leche juice, or an authentically made flan.”