Independent supermarket set for Upper Hutt’s Brewtown

Thursday, 14 August 2025

The burgeoning destination of Brewtown in Upper Hutt will welcome an independent supermarket next month, the second to be owned by Wellington businessman Henry Hutcheon.

Plenty Foods supermarket is set to open in late September and is currently scouting for talent, according to a job ad posted to Seek three weeks ago. The company was taking expressions of interest for 40 new staff to run the supermarket, which would be based in the northern side of Brewtown beer village.

It would be the second Hutt Valley supermarket in Plenty Foods Corp’s portfolio, after the Supersave supermarket in Naenae, which is also owned by Hutcheon.

The owner has a low profile and could not be reached for comment, but a post on what looks like a new Facebook page for the Brewtown site said “opening late September, Plenty Foods is Upper Hutt’s newest full-service supermarket, created by locals who believe grocery shopping should be fresh, fair, and full of choice …

“Our shelves will be stocked with the essentials you need and the extras you’ll love — from cheap, fresh produce and competitive meat prices to a wide range of grocery staples. We’re also your go-to destination for international confectionery, snacks, and drinks you won’t find anywhere else in Upper Hutt.”

Hutt Valley Chamber of Commerce chief executive Patrick McKibbin told The Post it was great news to see a Hutt Valley business expanding, as many local retailers and hospitality businesses were still battered with economic headwinds.

Although it may not have an impact on the supermarket duopoly, McKibbin said it added to the business diversity at popular village beer garden Brewtown which had ongoing success at its weekend fresh produce markets.

“They have a very successful market on Sundays – it’s super successful and it's under cover which means people are not subject to weather conditions, as at other local markets,” he said.

“If it brings people to Brewtown, that brings additional opportunities for retailers and hospitality businesses to gain new customers and get more spend, that’s a good thing.”

McKibbin said businesses in the area were “doing OK, but that’s not where they want to be”.

A recent report from the Hutt Valley Chamber of Commerce showed the region had an annual GDP of about $10 billion in 2023, up 25% on 2014, exceeding the average growth for Aotearoa.

The chamber had since introduced a “35 by 35” initiative, aimed at making the most of local business growth to achieve a further 35% economic growth by 2035.

“We know we will achieve more growth in the coming years, but it is tough at the moment,” McKibbin said.

Supermarket competition

The new supermarket is not a direct competitor with the duopoly, but one of the smaller, targeted competitors of the kind the supermarket duopoly has claimed does provide them competition.

Feeding into 2022’s Market Study into the retail grocery sector, the duopoly argued a wide range of different types of grocery retailers provided a strong competitive constraint to the traditional supermarket, especially for smaller shopping “missions”, and that these options were proliferating.

However, earlier this month, the Commerce Commission’s 2024 Annual Grocery Report found that New Zealand’s grocery sector remained one of the most concentrated in the developed world, with Foodstuffs and Woolworths NZ controlling 82% of the $27 billion retail grocery market in 2024, a share unchanged from the previous year and only slightly down over the past five years.

Foodstuffs’ North and South Island operations continue to post pre-tax earnings margins higher than almost all global competitors, including Walmart, Tesco, and Sainsbury’s.

Grocery Commissioner Pierre van Heerden said entering the industry for newcomers was challenging but not impossible as a small growth in specialist and independent supermarkets, clearance outlets, and online platforms had emerged, particularly in Auckland, but not yet at a scale to dent the duopoly’s dominance.