Much like the Cowboys, Rangers, Mavericks and Stars, H-E-B has plenty of fans in North Texas. The last time one of its stores opened in D-FW — in Mansfield in June — roughly a thousand shoppers lined up early to be the first ones inside, some of whom camped out overnight.
The fanfare will likely hit again Wednesday when H-E-B’s newest storefront opens for business at 6 a.m., bringing Frisco its second location. The 130,380-square-foot store at the Four Corners Shopping Center on the corner of University Drive and FM 423 near Little Elm began construction last summer and is the seventh H-E-B that has opened in North Texas since March 2021, when the San Antonio-based company first said it would be expanding into the region.
“Our job is to not just bring my H-E-B to Frisco, now it’s to extend my H-E-B within Frisco and the greater area and bring that feeling to a community that has no clue that there’s a spot missing in their heart for a grocery store. And if you don’t know, it is. It’s missing,” said Juan-Carlos Ruck, the Executive Vice President of the Northwest Food Drug Division of H-E-B stores. “... What we hope happens is what happens across the state when you shop with us and you get that feeling and you say, I’m going to my H-E-B, and it becomes possessive for you, hopefully, because of how it feels.”
The aim of “Frisco 2,” as store leaders call it, is to be a comprehensive shopping experience for residents of Frisco and the surrounding communities, which includes Prosper, Celina and Little Elm, among others.
“This will likely become people’s one-stop shop,” Ruck said. “For the most part, the shopping behavior in D-FW is they go to five or six different places. They’ll go somewhere for their fruits and vegetables, somewhere else for their home goods, somewhere else for bulk. [Here] you find a place with a single-stop shop.”
The new location, whose land was bought in 2017, was budgeted for roughly $32 million on top of $1.3 million for the property’s on-site gas station and car wash, according to 2023 state filings. Greg Bennion, the store’s top store leader, said it will employ some 700 employees, 80% of whom are new to the company, alongside 43 managers.
Upon entering Frisco 2, customers are greeted by H-E-B’s staple Texas barbeque restaurant, an in-house florist, hot cases with ready-to-eat meals and the produce section, which gradually meanders back into the bakery, butcher, fishmonger, wine/beer cellar and dairy fridges. The store, like most H-E-B locations, also features a pharmacy, e-commerce wing, home essentials section and an outdoor “Texas Backyard,” which supplies plants, pots and other outdoor goods.
H-E-B’s own-brand goods, which Bennion said account for roughly half of the store’s inventory, are perhaps its biggest sell. Ruck highlighted house-made tortillas, brisket queso, salsa and the “300 cheeses” it stocks, many of which sit in a 28-foot-long case in the store’s back left corner.
If Wednesday morning is anything like the six other H-E-B openings in D-FW, there may be hundreds — even thousands — of customers rushing the aisles as soon as doors open. The other H-E-B in Frisco, located at 4800 Main St., was the company’s first foray into North Texas, and much like the McKinney location that opened in June, “Frisco 1″ opened in September 2022 to 1,500 customers camping overnight, a drum line and DJ.
Even if that early morning rush makes a dent in the store’s shelves, Bennion said Frisco 2 has planned ahead to stock its back rooms with enough food and other household supplies so nothing runs out.
“We’re super excited to be part of this growing community,” Bennion said. “We hope to provide everything you need and more for the products you know and love today and some soon-to-be favorites.”
The other six locations in D-FW are spread between Plano, Allen, McKinney, North Fort Worth and Mansfield and a Joe V’s SmartShop in Wheatland. Ruck said the company “absolutely” wants to expand into Dallas and Fort Worth proper in the future, though no specific plans have been announced.
