Harding’s Marketplace- S. Westnedge, Portage
6330 S. Westnedge Avenue- Portage, MI 49002
- (269) 327-6733
- Website
This weekend has been wierd. J usually works Monday through Friday, but this weekend, she was asked to work a weekend shift. They gave her Friday off so she would get at least one day off this week. Normally, that’d be great, but this weekend, I worked Thursday, Friday, Sunday. So when I was off on Saturday, she was working.
I finished up our Christmas shopping with a trip to Best Buy then started towards home. I was contemplating stopping somewhere for dinner, but I spent quite a bit dining out in East Lansing, so I got the idea to stop at a grocery store instead.
Since I haven’t checked out the Harding’s in Portage yet and I was driving by it, I made the store on South Westnedge in the Southland Mall my stop.
My only experience with Harding’s is the store on Cork Street in Kalamazoo. I wasn’t super impressed. I mean, I liked the store, but it was cramped and looked to be an older building. This building in Portage is the exact opposite.
The store is much larger than the neighborhood type grocery store on Cork Street. They have a big deli with chicken, lunch meat, and prepared meals. There’s even a “cheese case” with some specialty cheeses near the bread aisle.
The deli leads right in to the produce section which gives way to the meat department which is where I was headed. In Lansing, I always shopped meat at Kroger because they had some pretty good “manager specials.” Meijer doesn’t have that, so I’m still looking for some place to get meat in Kalamazoo on the cheap.
They had some pretty good regular sales, but nothing I was interested in. They had ground beef on sale, but only in bulk quantities and I was eating alone. I eventually made my way to the end where I found a bunch of meat hastily thrown into a bin marked “manager’s special.” Yay!
There wasn’t really anything good, but I found some Veal Should Chops for a little over $3. I’m not a huge veal fan and I didn’t know how I was going to cook, but I bought it anyway. I figured I could just throw it on the grill and have a cheap, tough steak.
On my way to the cash register’s, I picked up a couple Pepsi’s. One for dinner, one for my drive back to East Lansing in the morning.
I was met at the cash register by a cashier who’s lane was empty. That never happens at the hyper-markets. She rang up my meat and pop and bagged them in a paper bag. The total for the veal and two pops was just a little over six bucks.
I liked this Harding’s. It’s big enough to have a good selection and they carry Spartan brand as their generic, but it’s not so big that shopping is a hassle. The prices may not be quite as low as a hyper-market, but for a quick shopping trip, it’s worth it to avoid the hassle.
SW Michigan Dining 
love this store better than any other
Went to this store this morning trying to get some donuts for my employees. At the ONE checkout open the clerk could not handle a simple ring-up and another clerk was half asleep on a bench and the help desk clerk was nowhere to be found. I will never go back even though i have tried the store many times service is always poor and extremely slow.
At least the store was open it is now closed down prob due to u pos knit pickers with no life
they had a Saturday sale with raspberries advertised for $1.77. When I got home I realized I was charged $2.50. When I went back the next day, I was told their shipment of raspberries didn’t come in and signs were posted that grapes were the substitute. I argued that I obviously bought raspberries and the price should be adjusted. The “customer service” clerk refused and refused to get a manager. NEVER going back there again – will support D&W!!
9-9-15 I bought some ground round at Hardings to make my coney sauce for hotdogs. I have not bought ground beef there for a couple years. Anyway, I made it like always, same spices, same amounts, timing, everything the same and to my horror, it is the texture of dogfood mush. Even the flavor is flat, but the worst is the pudding like texture of the MEAT. I called and talked to someone in the meat department and he said it comes in a TUBE and they grind it. Why would they grind it if it’s already ground?! Could it be to add that pink slime filler to extend the volume? Or is the tube the slime they add to real meat? Yipes. He said they didn’t do that. Why else is it goo? I sure hope they’re not doing that, but this experience does not make me willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Earth Fare and Costco and a couple other choice places are where I will continue to buy meat. By the way, I bought a Tender Ridge chuck roast at Hardings last week and crockpotted it for hours. It tasted good, but parts of it were still tough. I had to dice it up and make soup with it which was fine, but what gives?! What happened to Hardings meat?
Update: just bought ground beef at D&W to remake the coney sauce. It is looking very good…very different from the Hardings mush. We got the leaner 90/10 beef at D&W. I bet the leaner ground meat is harder to bulk up with filler.
Love your store. You are one of the few places that have Red Baron Breakfast Scrambles. But you don’t keep them stocked. When I was there over the weekend, there were only sausage. Where are the bacon and western ones? I’ve noticed this for a while. They are on special, but not stocked. Please keep the varieties stocked! Thank you!
I bought a pot pie at the Westnedge store but there are no directions to reheat it. I will try on my own but really help a body out.