Rancho Sahuarita Marketplace opens Chase Bank, Fry's Foods part of new retail development

The Rancho Sahuarita Marketplace is open for business, as the Chase Bank branch on the west side of Rancho Sahuarita Boulevard opened its doors Tuesday morning.

Next in line is Fry’s Foods, which is due for a ribbon cutting at 7 a.m. today on the northwest corner of Sahuarita Road and Rancho Sahuarita Boulevard.

The Chase Bank branch opened its drive-through lane at 8:30 a.m. and the lobby opened at 9 a.m., branch manager Martin Merancio said, capping an eight-month planning period and three months in which personal bankers enrolled nearly 200 new customers.

During the past three months, the bankers have been attending community events, from Fiesta Sahuarita to movie nights at the Rancho Sahuarita clubhouse, in their effort to develop new accounts, Merancio said.

Many of the branch’s 12 full-time staff live in Sahuarita, said Merancio, who was manager at the Green Valley branch on Esperanza Boulevard before being assigned to the Sahuarita store.

The branch is also home to three part-time staff who rotate among branches providing financial, investment and business banking services. Among the accounts they hope to win are those of the 300 or so employees at Fry’s.

An army of employees and contractors has been swarming around Fry’s for days, inside and out, assembling and stocking shelves; wheeling soft drink display cases into the store from delivery trucks; putting roof tiles in place; adding such decorative trim as faux balconies; placing the large outdoor signs on exterior walls; and unloading boxes, crates and pallets of grocery items.

Fry’s corporate spokeswoman Kendra Doyel said the average Fry’s store employs about 300 people and that most of the employees in Sahuarita are new hires, with some managers and experienced hands transferring from other Fry’s stores.

pfranchine@sahuaritasun.com | 547-9738