Jun. 12--OLYMPIA -- Construction of Village Thriftway, a grocery store proposed for the master-planned urban village known as Briggs Village, is expected to start this fall and open in summer 2010, the developer and store operator said Thursday.

Village Thriftway is envisioned as a 25,000-square-foot store west of Henderson Boulevard and north of Yelm Highway, said Kevin Stormans, co-owner of Stormans Inc., which operates the Bayview and Ralph's Thriftway stores in Olympia.

Stormans said the store will be about the same size as the Bayview Thriftway in downtown Olympia. Also planned for Village Thriftway is a coffee shop, an outdoor patio area and an 800-square-foot mezzanine with seating for about 40 people, he said. The store could employ up to 70 workers, Stormans said.

"It is going to be a very fresh, vibrant store that's going to have a lot of food offerings," said Stormans, including a section for locally grown and organic products. The back of the store will face a planned park and amphitheater that could be used for outdoor merchandising and barbecues, he said.

Stormans said discussions with the developers about building a store on the site started about two years ago.

"It came to the point where the store was a good fit and meshed with our current operations," he said.

As part of the development process, an architect and a civil engineer are set to meet with Olympia's community planning and development department next week to learn more about building requirements for the project, said Joe Amoroso, president of ADC Real Estate Group Inc., the Southern California company developing Briggs Village.