Nearly 700 Brooklynites Apply To Work At BK Navy Yard Wegmans

FORT GREENE, BROOKLYN — Before the highly-anticipated Wegmans opens at the Brooklyn Navy Yard this fall, the company will have to sift through more than 700 job applications from those who hope to work full-time at the supermarket giant.

The Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation announced this week that 741 job applications for Wegmans have flooded in to the Yard's employment center, nearly all from Brooklyn residents. The grocery chain will need to whittle the list down over the next few months to find the 150 or so employees that will make up the full-time staff at the new 79,000-square-foot outpost.

Much of the job applications that came in were due to an aggressive outreach campaign by the Navy Yard, which held dozens of information and application sessions in the community surrounding the Yard's Admirals Row.

“Our outreach team, which was 100 percent local, went above and beyond to ensure that anyone who wanted to apply for jobs at Wegmans had the tools to do so," said Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation President & CEO David Ehrenberg. "As a result, we far exceeded our expectations for full-time applications, and we hope to do the same once part-time hiring begins this spring.”

A little more than 40 percent of applicants are from the Navy Yard's two closest zip codes and 30 percent are from three closest New York City Housing Authority complexes; the Ingersoll, Whitman and Farragut houses. Almost all, or 93 percent, of the applicants are from Brooklyn, the Navy Yard said in a release.

The Yard's employment center hired eight locals to lead outreach efforts, attend nearly a dozen community and NYCHA resident association meetings and work with local elected officials.

“Wegmans is great for our neighborhood and I felt like a community leader being able to connect local residents to these job opportunities” said Rachel Simmons, an Ingersoll resident who worked part time for the Brooklyn Navy Yard to publicize the application events.

The application events included more than 20 information and resume sessions and more than 40 application sessions to offer resume and interview tips. A second round of these application events are planned for this spring to help with the hiring process for part-time positions.

A total of 500 full-time and part-time employees will make up the supermarket's staff, which is the first Wegmans outpost in New York City.

The building itself has topped out on Fulton Street at six stories high, though the Wegmans will occupy only the bottom two floors.

The new Wegmans is part of the yard's extensive redevelopment of its Admirals Row and 399 Sands site. It will also include the development of 78,000 square feet of retail space, 356,000 square feet of light industrial space, and 11,000 square feet of community facility space, according to the yard.

Rendering provided by Wegmans. Photo by Anna Quinn/Patch.