Friedman's Freshmarket at Point Plaza in Butler Township is closing. Merchandise at the store has been marked down and the store will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily until all items are sold.

BUTLER TWP — Friedman's Freshmarket is closing its Point Plaza store on New Castle Road.

Carole Bitter, president and CEO of the grocery store chain, said Tuesday that “closing the store will allow our 112-year-old company to redeploy assets to continue to serve the people of Butler County.”

She spent Tuesday meeting with Point Plaza's 38 full- and part-time employees about the closing, as well as saying goodbye to customers.

“We've really had loyal customers to the plaza store. Some came in today almost in tears, but the market pressure west of town is just too much,” Bitter said of the other grocery shopping opportunities on New Castle Road.

“There is so much competition with drug stores, the dollar stores and the global companies such as Walmart; Aldi's, a German company; and Bottom Dollar, a Belgium company,” Bitter said. “Companies like Aldi's and Bottom Dollar can't grow anymore in their home countries so they are looking at the American market for growth.”

The Point Plaza store is the only Friedman's store to be closing, but big changes are planned for most of its other stores.

Bitter said the company plans to remodel both the store on West Brady Street in Butler and the Greater Butler Mart store on Route 8 south.

As for the Chicora store, Bitter said the company is going to double its size and is looking to bring in other businesses to the site on Route 68 that overlook the town, such as a hardware store or other stores that would enhance shopping there.

The Friedman's store in Saxonburg also will remain open.

Bitter added that Friedman's is deciding whether those stores would be independently owned or franchises owned by Friedman's.

As for the Point Plaza store's employees, Bitter said union contracts do not allow the company to immediately send workers to other Friedman's locations, but that “as business picks up in the other stores and as the economy improves, we expect to hire back as many people as possible.”

Friedman's has operated a grocery at the New Castle Road location for almost 50 years. Bitter said the first Friedman's in Point Plaza was in the site now occupied by the Scrapbook Station.

“Then we moved to where Altmeyers is and between our store and the Kmart (which is the current Friedman's location) we didn't have enough parking for our customers,” Bitter said.

When Kmart moved to the Pullman Square Shopping Center on Hansen Avenue in the 1990s, Friedman's moved into the vacant space. The company leases that space from Union Real Estate.

Merchandise at the Point Plaza store has been marked down, and the store will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily until all items are sold.

Special orders that were placed at the plaza store will be filled by the Friedman's at the Greater Butler Mart.

“We thank you for being our customer at the Friedman's Freshmarket at Point Plaza and sincerely appreciate the patronage and support of both our long-standing customers and our new customers who have only recently discovered us, and we hope we will earn your business at our other stores,” Bitter added.