SOUTH PORTLAND – Stephanie Smart does most of her weekly grocery shopping at a supermarket near her home in North Windham. But on a recent trip to the Target store in South Portland, she took a few minutes to stock up on some basics in the store's grocery section, which was significantly expanded a couple of years ago.
"I'm here anyway," she explained, strolling past shelves packed with cereal, pasta and bread and coolers stocked with frozen food, milk and juice.
Smart's shopping trip is representative of a major shift under way in the marketplace. The big, traditional supermarket chains that dominate the Maine market, such as Shaw's and Hannaford, still draw plenty of shoppers, but competition for the dollars that were predominantly spent in those stores has heightened sharply in recent years. Today less than half of consumers' food budgets are spent at supermarkets, down significantly from just a few years ago.
And now Shaw's and Hannaford are facing another challenge: Market Basket, a Massachusetts-based chain known for its low prices, will open a store in Biddeford in a few weeks, its first in Maine and 72nd overall.
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