The Willy Street Co-op’s east location had its grand reopening this past weekend to reveal the new and improved building after going through a 10-month-long renovation process.

The east location’s “recycle, remodel, reopen” event, as described by its website, featured kebobs, coffee and live music to celebrate the reveal of the updates to the store.

“We had been talking about this for a number of years but we wanted to hold off until our west store was fully operating,” Brendon Smith, director of Communications, said.

The Willy Street Co-op, which was founded in 1974, “is Madison’s largest consumer-owned natural foods store,” according to its website.

Holding off until the west store was up and running would guarantee that Willy Street Co-op customers would still be able to shop at the west store location while the east side was under construction, Smith said. After the west location was open for about two years, he said planning for the east side renovation project began.

“There were some pieces of equipment and some aspects that were overdue for replacement. We thought well, we’re already making all these changes so why don’t we improve things?” Smith said. “So that’s what we did.”

Among the improvements are a newly renovated self-serve hot bar, full service meat counter, a third customer bathroom and a fresh coat of paint for the entire building. Smith said the cheese department and juice bar were moved during renovations in order to make them “more accessible and customer friendly.”

Inefficient equipment was also updated, as well as the outdoor and indoor customer seating, he said. All in all, the entire cost of renovations was about $4 million and spanned a 10 month period.

Along with the east side renovations, a third Willy Street Co-op store is potentially in the works. While Smith said they haven’t figured out exactly where this possible third store would be, he said it would be somewhere in the Madison area.

An employee from the Willy Street west location reiterated Smith’s statement about the uncertainty surrounding aspects of the third possible location, saying that no news has been released to the public yet because no concrete decision regarding the location has been made.

For a decision to be reached, the employee said a lot of money and many votes must be taken into account.

“Any renovation would need a large amount of money, and those [decisions] are usually announced publicly. Large amounts of money like that are controlled by owner votes and the committee of people coming together to decide the location of the third store haven’t made any announcements yet,” the employee said.

While there is no clear word yet on a location or date of the third store opening, Smith said he is hopeful that one is in the works.