Speculation: Greek Supermarket Coming to Old Sunnyside Prints Space?

Back in April we got wind of changes coming to the Sunnyside Prints building, which has seemed abandoned for many years. This is the low-rise brick factory building at 22-78 35th Street—right under the Amtrack/Hell Gate trestle where all the birds congregate (and you know what that means), and next to the Taminent Democratic Club.

We reached out to the contact associated with this property, but nothing has come of it. So, we did a little digging, and realized one other name attached is Bill Tentolouris, owner and CEO of Mediterranean Foods and Mediterranean Foods II, both located in Astoria on 34th Street and 31st Streets, respectively. This guy knows his Greek specialty market business—his markets are known for the vast array of cheeses, Greek pantry items and dry goods, as well as house-made pork sausage and Cypriot-style meatballs. He is involved in this property as either the owner or lease holder.

They went through many plan exams and re-exams and it seems like things are moving forward. City records indicate they’ve committed at least $320,000 to this project. They’ll use that for the conversion from factory to supermarket, including a total renovation of the inside and a new storefront. Earlier this year they asked to remove all the non-load-bearing walls, probably to simply open up the space so they can figure out how to work with it.

Here’s the plot diagram of this 4,393 square foot building.

It looks like perhaps more progress is happening. Our friend Adam snapped the following photo this morning, noticing things were getting cleared out.

So, is this going to be an locally-grown business or is it a Greek company opening up a supermarket in Astoria? Both scenarios have occurred to us. We’ll continue to dig around and see if we can find out more info. We’ll share that here as it comes to us.

Would you like to see a Greek supermarket in this space? Or something else? Let us know in the comments or twitter/Facebook!