Fresh Food, Local Food

The NYTimes has an article on NYC's loss of supermarkets, meaning more people have to drive (assuming they have a car in NYC) to buy fresh produce. Apparently rents are rising (presumably because of a still hot real estate market and the rejuvenation of the city) and the profit margins just aren't there. Supermarkets are facing competition from other outlets, which sell milk, beer, etc. Reading between the lines, produce must have especially low profit margins. Perhaps because of spoilage--how often do you see lots of produce in the supermarket that's past it? And that's with the advantage of loyalty cards, so they can tell that the Harshaws will buy 14 bananas a week with about 95 percent reliability. Or maybe it's the problem of establishing reliable supplies over the year. That says something about the problems faced by the locavore movement and organic farming.