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Mostly Cloudy Brach's kosher supermarket closing on May 1
Brooklyn-based KRM/Moisha's reported buyer
Despite nearly three months of denials, the rumor has become fact: Brach’s a kosher supermarket in Lawrence will be closing.
According to information posted on the New York State Department of Labor website the store will layoff 127 employees and shut its doors on May 1. Economic factors were given as the reason for closing.
In an email, Jack Brach said that the store was sold, but he cannot reveal any further details due to a non-disclosure agreement he has with the buyer, he said.
The Jewish Star reported that sources have told them that a Brooklyn-based discount kosher grocer — KRM/Moisha’s — is the new owner of the 40,000-square-foot store. KRM/Moisha officials declined to confirm. “I’m sorry, we have no comments to make on this,” an unidentified official responded in an email. “Thank you.”
Rumors of the market on Lawrence Lane either closing or being sold began to surface in November. There was no official denial, but one store clerk who declined to give his name said then: “That rumor has been around since my son was bar mitzvahed.”
On Jan. 20, many of the store’s shelves were not restocked with merchandise and the employees had a meeting in one section of the store where the
discussion revolved around unemployment.
Another unidentified employee said that Jack Brach, the store’s owner, has “problems.” He did not specify what those problems are. A customer said that one of the employee’s said he wasn’t paid in weeks.
Brach, is the son of Sam Brach, who opened the Lawrence store in 1997. Sam, a Holocaust survivor, was a butcher in Kew Gardens and transformed his small Queens market into a kosher supermarket.
Jack is known as a generous man. He has delivered food to stranded travelers at John F. Kennedy International Airport, was instrumental providing assistance after Hurricane Sandy and after he learned of a customer’s desire to see the Rolling Stones in concert, surprised the person with tickets. The patron was speechless and very grateful. The Brach name is also synonymous with political support mostly for the Republican Party locally and nationally, and for Israel.
