DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, Councilmember Vincent Gray, community members and many excited area residents turned out Sept. 27 for the official ribbon cutting of the Lidl grocery store at Skyland Town Center.
More than 200 people were in attendance for the event and open house that followed. Lidl is the first full service grocery store to open east of the Anacostia River in more than a decade. Skyland is Lidl’s first store in the District of Columbia.
Lidl hired more than 60 people to work at the Skyland store. Almost all of the new employees live in Wards 7 & 8, and they all found their jobs through a hiring fair at the Skyland Workforce Center. WC Smith and Rappaport founded the Workforce Center in 2014; it’s now a program of Building Bridges Across the River.
The store officially opened on Sept. 28, with at least 150 people waiting in line to start shopping – the first person arrived at 4am. Lidl gave gift cards and other prizes to the first 100 people in line.
The Lidl Skyland store is pursuing LEED Certification. To obtain this certification, Lidl Skyland is prioritizing the use of sustainable building materials to create a healthy, energy-efficient, and “green” store. Lidl Skyland will also feature six electric vehicle charging stations for customers and employees.
Skyland Town Center is a mixed-use development located at the intersection of Alabama Avenue, Naylor Road, and Good Hope Road SE in Washington’s Ward 7. Rappaport and WC Smith, lead the retail and residential leasing and strategy, respectively.
Several restaurants opened at Skyland this year: Roaming Rooster, &Pizza, Fuji Hibachi & Sushi, and the first drive-through Starbucks in DC. Like That Barber Shop and Skyland Nail Salon and Spa also opened. They joined a CVS and a Chase Bank branch, and The Crest, a 263-unit multifamily property, which opened in April 2021.
Scheduled to open later this year are Mezeh, Maizal, Tropical Smoothie Café and Edenbridge PACE healthcare center.
