Sacramento-area Amazon Fresh locations to close as giant pivots to Whole Foods
Amazon will close all of its Amazon Fresh grocery stores, including the three in the Sacramento region that serve as the company’s only Northern California locations, the retailer announced Tuesday.
A final date was not announced, but Amazon Fresh’s Elk Grove, Roseville and Citrus Heights stores are among 57 Fresh locations nationwide slated to close, the e-commerce giant said in a statement. The online retailer had 19 other stores in California, all in Southern California.
Amazon will also close 15 of its Amazon Go locations as the company turns away from brick-and-mortar grocery stores to concentrate on online same-day delivery and its Whole Foods Market brand.
The company said it would open more than 100 additional Whole Food stores over the next several years. Some Amazon Fresh stores slated for closure will be converted into Whole Foods locations, the company said, though the company did not say which stores would be converted.
Amazon’s Sacramento-area rollout was uneven from the start. While stores in Elk Grove, Roseville and Citrus Heights eventually opened, a planned Amazon Fresh location in Arden Arcade never did, despite more than a year of construction activity at Watt and El Camino avenues.
In Elk Grove, where Amazon Fresh opened after more than a year of delays at The Ridge shopping center at Elk Grove Boulevard and Bruceville Road in September 2024 after years of speculation and delays, construction of a new Whole Foods Market nearby is nearly complete. Amazon bought the upscale chain in 2017 for about $13.5 billion.
The 40,000-square-foot Whole Foods at Elk Grove Boulevard and Big Horn Boulevard will anchor The Village shopping, retail and dining center, with an opening set for September.
Elk Grove officials Tuesday frowned at the news but said the city would be working with The Ridge shopping center to fill the space.
“We are disappointed that Amazon Fresh is closing its Northern California stores. While this decision is unfortunate, it appears to be a national corporate decision and not the result of local conditions,” Darrell Doan, Elk Grove economic development director, said in a statement. “We remain excited about the upcoming opening of Amazon’s Whole Foods at The Village in Elk Grove and are committed to working with the owners of The Ridge to identify new tenants for the space.”
Amazon Fresh shoppers Tuesday afternoon in Elk Grove were met with locked doors and signs posted at the entrance.
“We are closed for the remainder of the day. We apologize for any inconvenience. Please come back tomorrow during our normal business hours,” the signs read. It was not known if the closure Tuesday was related to the announcement.
The Amazon Fresh in Citrus Heights opened in November 2024, a 38,000-square-foot store at 5425 Sunrise Blvd., joining Amazon Fresh’s maiden Northern California location on Stanford Ranch Road in Roseville. The Roseville site also opened in September 2024.
But the e-commerce giant’s foray into Northern California and the growing Sacramento market appeared short-lived as the company struggled to attract customers with lower prices and automated conveniences, including app-aided shopping and Ask Alexa features.
“We’re grateful to our team members for their many contributions over the years and are working whenever possible to help them find roles elsewhere in Amazon, including across our vast operations network, as we make this transition,” the company said.
Amazon said in its statement that it had not developed a scalable economic model for its Amazon Fresh stores.
Those pressures may have been more acute locally as Amazon Fresh competed with popular membership retailers such as Costco and Sam’s Club on price and market share.
Still, Amazon said it would be expanding its Same-Day Delivery service for fresh groceries, which is now available in about 2,300 U.S. cities and towns. The company said perishable grocery sales through the service have grown 40-fold in the past year, and that fresh items now make up nine of the 10 most-ordered products in markets where the service is available.
This story was originally published January 27, 2026 at 1:54 PM.
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