Brookfield First Selectman Talks Amazon Fresh Bait and Switch

Amazon Fresh jerked around the residents of Brookfield, Connecticut for nearly four years.

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We started talking about the possibility of an Amazon Fresh store in Brookfield back in 2021 and now in 2024, there is still no Amazon store and there never will be. Recently it was announced that a Big Y store would go where the Amazon store was supposed to be.

We decided to call on Brookfield First Selectman Steve Dunn to put a bow on this frustrating story. Dunn joined us on the Tuesday (1/30/24) edition of the I95 Morning Show.

Lou: We just learned recently that Amazon is done with Brookfield and a Big Y Store is going in it's place. Can you tell us how this happened?

Dunn: "Yeah, Amazon does not give us the inner-workings of their operations but it was pretty clear. Remember they finished up and they put up the Amazon Fresh sign and then they stopped dead and they were radio silent for a couple of years? In talking to our EDC guy Greg Dembowski, they called him a week ago and said listen Amazon has decided to pivot is the word they used and we're changing our approach. So, they are closing down a lot of stores in the Northeast and Brookfield was one of them. As part of that, I just met last week with the Vice President of Big Y, he is in charge of their development. They've already got a plan, they have a floor plan they want to use and they had been talking to Amazon and it is going to be a good move I think."

Lou: Were you or Tara Carr under any sort of non-disclosure or confidentiality agreement at any point? It just seems no one was given any information.

Dunn: "No I don't think the Town was, I don't think my predecessor was. I know even when I was in office before when they were building it and building out, they would not even tell us who was coming in."

We asked all the follow-up questions you might imagine and Steve Dunn answered every one of them the best he could, as did his predecessor Tara Carr. From what we can tell from the information we've been given, Amazon was extremely tight-lipped and obviously did not have their s--- together.

You can listen to our full (1/30/24) interview with Steve Dunn below.

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