Amazon is closing its Fresh grocery store in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, the company confirmed Wednesday, saying that it plans to focus on redesigned stores with an expanded selection.
The last day of business for the store at 610 E. Pike St. will be Sunday.
The Seattle Times first reported the news, citing an all-hands meeting for store employees that took place on Wednesday.
After years of being shrouded in secrecy, the store opened in February 2020 as the first Amazon Go Grocery location, featuring Amazon’s “Just Walk Out” cashierless technology across a 7,700-square-foot space.
The closure news comes on the same day that Amazon Web Services announced it would be cutting hundreds of jobs, including on its Physical Stores Technology team.
Amazon also confirmed it will be removing Just Walk Out tech from existing large-format Fresh stores and won’t include the system of overhead cameras and shelf sensors in new stores. Amazon said it plans to rely on Dash Carts, which keep track of items and costs as shoppers place those items in the high-tech shopping carts and skip the checkout lines.
Just Walk Out will continue to be used in Amazon Go convenience stores, and will be licensed to third parties for use in such places as sports stadiums, airports and on college campuses.
Amazon told GeekWire that it has redesigned a number of its full-sized Fresh stores over the last year in a bid to offer a better overall shopping experience with an expanded selection, low prices and updated checkout options such as the carts.
“We’re pleased to see those changes resonating with customers through higher satisfaction scores and increased purchasing,” Jessica Martin, an Amazon spokesperson, said via email. “To focus on selectively opening new Amazon Fresh stores as we see positive customer feedback on the new format, we are closing our smaller Amazon Fresh store in Seattle.”
Amazon would not say how many employees will be affected by the closure, but said all have been offered roles at nearby Fresh stores. Amazon said the store will be closed Wednesday and Thursday before reopening Friday through Sunday, with items discounted at 75%.
Before opening as a Go Grocery in 2020, the location was the subject of intense speculation for years on Capitol Hill. In 2017, Capitol Hill Seattle Blog reported on the rumors that Amazon was bringing a grocery to store to the bottom of an apartment complex where a Mercedes Benz dealership once stood. By 2019, permit drawings for the secretive space showed up, and later that year, Amazon would only confirm that its Go team was “running internal tests” at the location.
Amazon has four Fresh locations in the greater Seattle area, including in Bellevue and Federal Way, Wash., and on Aurora Avenue North and Jackson Street in Seattle. There are more than 40 Amazon Fresh stores across the U.S.
Amazon previously closed its only two Amazon Fresh pickup locations, in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood in 2023 and in SoDo in January.
In recent years, Amazon’s brick-and-mortar ambitions were reeled in with the closure of multiple physical retail locations, including all of its Amazon 4-star, Books, and Pop Up stores. Last March it closed a number of Go stores.
During a Q4 earnings call in February, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said he was pleased with the progress the company was making in retail grocery.
“It’s a big business, and it’s continuing to grow at a very healthy clip, and we’re really pleased with that business,” Jassy said. “If you want to serve as many grocery needs as we do, you have to have a mass physical presence, and that’s what we’ve been trying to do with Fresh over several years.”
