A FreshCo discount grocery store is scheduled to open in 2027 north of Duncan, kitty-corner from a Thrifty Foods-anchored retail centre along the Trans Canada Highway, Citified has learned.

 

 

Calgary-based commercial real-estate developer Royop is reviving the vacant Somenos Marketplace strip mall in North Cowichan along the 2700-block of Beverly Street at Highway 1, with an anchor tenant FreshCo that will occupy the former location of McFrugal’s Discount Outlet, Speedy Glass and furniture retailer Island Home Forever.

 

The company also has plans to add 8,200 square feet of new-build multi-tenant retail spaces to Somenos Marketplace along the Beverly Street frontage.

 

FreshCo is part of Nova Scotia-based Sobeys grocery empire, which acquired Thrifty Foods in 2007 from Victoria’s Campbell family. Since then, Sobey’s has been overseeing a steady expansion of its grocery business throughout the Island and BC, including investments in retail centres anchored by the company’s grocery brands that include IGA and Safeway. Langford’s Thrifty Foods-anchored Belmont Market shopping centre is an example of such an investment, developed by Crombie REIT that is partially owned by Nova Scotia’s Empire Company, the owner of Sobeys. A FreshCo is expected to open at West Shore Town Centre, opposite Belmont Market, later this year.

 

Royop’s Somenos retail play is not far from the newly unveiled Parhar Centre, a 150,000 square foot retail plaza Citified covered earlier in January, currently leasing units for its first phase of retail construction on Herd Road at the Trans Canada Highway just a stone’s throw from Cowichan’s upcoming Quw’utsun Valley Hospital. The project will deliver approximately two dozen retail units at full build-out, with commercial spaces ranging from 1,200 square feet to 15,000 square feet across an eight-acre site.

 

 

In addition to Somenos Marketplace, Royop is pursuing a commercial development in Victoria’s western suburb of Sooke, that has been making its way through the municipal planning process since 2021. Royop is proposing a 70,000 square foot retail and 200-unit residential project after several years of planning at the same site under the auspices of another firm that focused entirely on a commercial square footage. Royop’s project, on West Coast Road/Highway 14 just west of Otter Point Road in Sooke’s town centre, has been described by the proponent as featuring a coastal Nordic style of architecture. No construction timelines are currently available. C

 

© Copyright 2026 by Citified.ca. All rights reserved.