Ultra Foods

Their produce is never that great but recently I bought an 8lb bag of oranges nd more than half were rotten. That is unacceptable. I dropped a letter to the store and I never heard back, that is also unacceptable. I will buy groceries somewhere else from now on, franky their prices are not that great.

EXTREMELY EXPENSIVE!!!
This store seems to be extremely high for certain things. I was coming here to purchase fresh fish and shrimp and then I realized it was highway robbery!!! The shrimp was $ 11.99lb. I turned around and walked out. I went to Jewel and they had it for $ 7.99. Regularly it was $ 9.99. They’ve lost my business. The other items were always overly priced, but they’ve just become outrage with their seafood and meat selections.

This is the very definition of sketchy. The place looked dingy, the produce did not excite me, and (to top it off) the cashiers would leave their «lane open» light when they left to go chat with their friends. Not a place I plan on returning when Tony’s Finer Things and Jewel are not too much further away.

This review is based off two incidents at this location. Today was the 2^nd time I a few weeks were I put my groceries on the counter and the cashier never looked up at me, said hello, nothing. Now both times, the cashier was a African American person. After handing me the receipt, both times I never got a thank you, have a good day, go f yourself, nothing. As I bagged my groceries the next person in line was an African American and they got greeted with a «how are you today». It’s getting aggravating with all the double standard BS.

OK, after my last review, I had an awful experience with the fish department. I asked the young man to cut up a nice, large catfish i saw. Well, when I got home and opened the package I just about fell out ! Really? He couldn’t tell he was cutting up a rotten fish? I took it back and CS offered not only to refund my $, but GIVE me a replacement. NO THANKS! IF I go in there now, it’s because they have a decent price on the dry soup mixes. And I go at 7AM, to avoid the ‘masses’. I pass the stinky, high-​price produce, smile at the meat counter, get my soup and leave. The place is still the pits. I don’t know who can buy the produce, let along the meat. maybe it’s the cheap boxes of cereal.

I have to say that this is my favorite grocery store to shop at right now. They are always clean and stocked pretty well, and there is always a deal to be found here. And the majority of the times I’ve shopped here, I haven’t had to worry about a line or much of a wait to check out. Only once or twice have I been here and had to wait in a fairly long line to check out. My only issue with this place is that it’s not necessarily close to me. It would be nice if they decided to expand and add more locations. But if that would compromise their quality then I don’t blame them for keeping it the way it is. Until something different or new comes along this will remain on my list of go to grocery stores.

This discount grocery store is the only food shopping in a mile radius. I’m assuming that’s why so many shop here.
The store certainly is huge. And yet most of the products on offer are very ordinary. It is nice if you want to buy barbecue sauce by the gallon. But for regular sizes, the prices are usually nothing special.
Dishonorable mention for the produce section, for its high prices and limited selections (in spite of a decent amount of floorspace). This may be due to the store’s clientele, which seem to tend more towards processed cuisine.
I’m not sure how a store this large could be so lame, or why so many go here. Another Forest Park mystery.

idk why i havent reviewed this place cuz ive shopped here so many times. but i just went here before the 4^th of july & it was quite busy as i figured it would be. they had sime great items on sale so i had 2 get these goodies, as well as other items on my grocery list. great prices & lines werent too bad!

This is my 2^nd time in this Ultra Foods and I must say that I still love it. The prices are reasonable, the staff members are helpful. There wasn’t a long line and the store appeared to be organized and clean.

Only for selected boxed goods.
Such bad experiences here, I can’t even begin to describe. Staff is rude and unresponsive. Fruits and vegetables look like their rotten almost all the time. Seriously, I don’t trust any of the fresh food from here. I have never given a 1 star review and this one totally is deserving.
As I said, boxed goods. Even those, check the dates and expect to be there for an hour waiting in line at the checkout.

Store update review:
Ugh I forgot my own Unilocal review and came back to here to buy groceries. Fruit/​vegetable are poor quality. Small and expensive. I can’t believe that somehow I got duped into coming in here again. Sigh… the avocado were so small that even with them on sale it felt like I was being ripped off. The only real deal are the sale items! There is self check out to speed up the process.

Poor fresh vegetable quality over the years. The store is not always well organized. The fruits are decent but not when there is a sale. They have some good prices when it comes to sale time but get ready for those rain check slips if (and they will be) out of the sale item. I gave them two stars instead of one star because of the sales they have as well as being 24 hours.

Ultra Foods isn’t that bad if you’re there when it’s not overly crowded. I learned that hard way that you do NOT go there at the time when people get their welfare checks or Link cards reloaded or however it works. I’m all for helping out my fellow man, but it means a stampede of people at Ultra Foods.
Their coupon policy is fabulous, you can use them 30 days past the expiration date. Their prices are also very good and they run great sales. It sickens me that I used to shop at the Jewel in River Forest and *gasp* never used coupons! I was getting ripped off!
What is actually shockingly good is their bakery department. I love the coffee cake, turnovers, little angel food cakes with raspberry filling…
We haven’t been there as often as we used to go (I have no idea what I’ve been eating for the past few months, in fact) but when we do shop for groceries (the items that we can’t find at ALDI) Ultra Foods is where we go. The store is huge and they have a decent selection. I can’t find everything here, but they have most things that we buy.
We go to the one out in Lombard or whatever too, but the Forest Park location is just a few blocks from where we live so it’s way more convenient.
Just heed my warning and I cannot reiterate enough: DO NOT GO AROUND THE 1ST OF THE MONTH! It’s utter madness.

When Cub’s became Ultra they lost a little flair. This Ultra has prepared food that is second to none (when it comes to grocery store prepared foods).
Now when it comes to the groceries themselves — they have a great and very wide selection. Many of their prices and specials are 10 times better than jewel or dominick’s — yet with Wal-​mart at the end of the parking lot they often don’t compete in the produce department.
Dry goods — this is your place.

This place is very affordable! It reminds of of the supermarket back home in Los Angeles because of the many good deals and vast variety of Hispanic food products. Why go to the Jewel and spend triple the amount that you would save at going to Ultra Foods? At times, you just need to stock on a few items and don’t feel like spending half of you pay check on silly groceries at Whole Foods.

I am a true Jewel and Whole Foods loyal customer but on occassion, I come here if there’s a special item on sale that I need. Or if my team at work is having a party and I need to pickup a quick pastry item.
The location is convenient, right off of Roosevelt and Des Plaines. Prices here are reasonable and you can always find a park since it’s located in the former Forest Park Mall shopping center.
Now Ultra will never replace the warm feeling I get when I visit a Jewel, but it’s a great fallback place when I need to get something in a hurry.

This place is THE prime piece of proof that the lovely village of Forest Park IL is going to Hell in a hurry!
Came here yesterday with a couple cousins from Maywood, and wow, we all hated being inside here with a bunch of no-​manners shoppers who gave us nasty looks for no reason at all. I and an eight-​year-​old girl with me, my cousin, saw a woman who wore a shirt with absolutely no sides, so we all saw her snow-​white bra! A couple shoppers ran into my 8-​y-​o cousin during our trip in the store and didn’t seem too willing to apologize.
Then, there was a package of bread whose expiration date was August 15^th or something like it, and was still on the shelf behind the fresher bread and still was on the shelf for full price, not a reduced price. It should be off the shelf entirely if you ask me!
I just do not know why this place has an overall four-​star review. The location on Kedzie & 87^th is much better and I’m judging that on the four times I’ve been there! Had NO problems with food, customers, employees, etc., at that location ever, but yesterday was the first time I entered this location in Forest Park and experienced the grocery store trip from Hell! To the residents of Forest Park, the ruly, law-​abiding residents of FP, you may want to do yourself a favor and sign a petition to have this place either clean up its act or get shut the hell down!

This place is enormous, and has great prices for everything there. I was lucky, though, to have my boyfriend as my sherpa guide, or it would have been the most endless shopping trip in history, as I wandered up and down the aisles, just trying to take everything in.
They have an awesome section of vegetarian frozen items, pretty much every MorningStar product I’ve ever seen.
But, there were a few things we came looking for that we didn’t find… Whole wheat bread flour for one, but more significantly, fresh pineapple. When we asked the produce guy, he said they would be «out for the year.»
It’s early July.
Aside from those minimal disappointments, Ultra Foods definitely delivered on the shopping experience we wanted!

Good prices, good produce, good bakery, open 24 hours.
It has good food for reasonable everyday prices, but it is not the place to go if you are in a hurry!
Unfortunately, besides low prices, they appear to have a low budget POS CashRegister system as sometimes there are problems w registers, problems accepting cards that work elsewhere, and I’ve sometimes seen long lines behind a half-​working cash register).
Also should mention that, debit cards are not processed locally (shows up on bank statement as a transaction from a grocery store of a different name from Indiana!!). So if you use a debit card and see a strange charge (correct amount, wrong store) on your bank statement, it’s this place (As I haven’t been in Indiana in over a year, I actually cancelled my Debit card when I saw this charge from out of state, took me a couple days to figure out the charge was actually from the local Ultra. which was an inconvenience)… but other than that, the store is OK.
Bag groceries yourself.
Use your own grocery bags, be green, and get a discount.

Good produce selection & price. No annoying, innaccurate and insane in-​store advertising a-​la Jewel. Nice deli & bakery also (though I almost never purchase baked goods a cake slice was pretty good).
I don’t like that they carry no free range and/​or hormone free meat and very little in the way of milk, eggs & cheese that fit that criteria. Even if they charged a bunch more I would prefer to shop at Ultra than Whole Foods for similar products.
I’ve always found the staff to be helpful and engaging in a genuine way that Jewel & Dominicks absolutely lack (Whole Foods does well on this count). And again, with the clientele, I don’t know what «coming from church» is supposed to signify (I suspect color), but I’ve never had issue with them other than the standard grocery store crammed with folks moving at variable speeds that is expected.