Best Market in East Rockaway to close for months amid transition to Lidl

The East Rockaway Best Market store will close later this month through early April as it is renovated into a Lidl supermarket.

Lidl, a German-based supermarket chain, acquired 27 Best Market locations in New York and New Jersey in 2018.

“It was supposed to happen over the summer, but they’ve been delayed,” East Rockaway Mayor Bruno Romano said, adding that the coronavirus caused the postponement. “They’re just going to shutdown and redo the whole store.”

Romano said he was uncertain of the exact date that the store would close or how many employees would be kept. Calls to the store and its corporate office were not returned at press time Tuesday.

Best Market opened to much fanfare in October 2016 as many East Rockaway residents rejoiced at not having to cross into Oceanside to go grocery shopping.

Though he said the store closing for several months could have a negative impact on East Rockaway, Romano said, he was excited for it to reopen as Lidl.

“It’s going to shift everybody into Oceanside for shopping, but we’ve been through it before when Pathmark was out, so they came back,” he said, referring to Best Market replacing the former Pathmark store that occupied the building at 492 E. Atlantic Ave. “It’s going to be a few months of inconvenience.”