7 Things Fareway Does Differently Than Hy-Vee That Iowans Notice
Many Iowans have a favorite grocery store—Fareway or Hy-Vee—and they stick with it.
The two chains can look alike from the road. Step inside, and the differences start to show.
Here’s where they split on your next grocery run.
1. Store Hours
Fareway locks up early.
Its Des Moines-area stores post Monday through Saturday hours that end at 8 or 9 p.m., depending on the store.
Johnston and Ankeny open at 7 a.m., and the rest of the metro stores make you wait until 8.
The doors stay shut on Sundays.
Hy-Vee runs the other direction.
Its West Lakes store in West Des Moines lists itself open daily from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m., and the Park Avenue store in Des Moines posts the same hours.
So if you need milk at 9:30 on a Tuesday night in the Des Moines metro, Fareway’s stores are already locked up.
Hy-Vee’s West Lakes and Park Avenue locations are still ringing up sales at that hour.
2. Fuel Discounts
Hy-Vee’s Perks program pays you back at the pump.
The fuel discounts you earn on groceries come off your fill-up at Hy-Vee Fast & Fresh pumps or at participating Casey’s, Shell and Sinclair stations, under the program’s terms.
Where does Fareway send its rewards, if not to a gas pump?
Its cash back runs through Ibotta, so you unlock rebates before you shop and give the cashier your phone number at checkout.
The money shows up in the app within 48 hours, cash instead of a discount you’d have to drive somewhere to collect.
Fareway’s Ibotta page never mentions fuel at all.
Hy-Vee’s Perks Fine Print
Hy-Vee’s Perks fuel discounts expire 30 days after you buy the item that earned them.
One fill-up can take the discount on 20 gallons at most, under the Perks terms.
You also have to use the Perks card at checkout to earn the reward in the first place.
3. Home Delivery
At Fareway, online orders end in the parking lot.
You order on shop.fareway.com or the app, pick a time slot, and a team member loads the bags into your car when you pull in.
The grocery FAQ puts a $30 minimum on curbside orders with no added fee.
Pickup runs Monday through Saturday, in as little as three hours.
Slots are limited each day, so order early if you want a choice of times.
Hy-Vee will drive the groceries to your door.
Its Park Avenue store in Des Moines posts delivery hours of 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. alongside pickup from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., seven days a week.
When Hy-Vee Plus launched in 2020, standard delivery cost $9.95 an order at the time, and the $99-a-year membership made it free.
Fareway’s pages describe pickup, not delivery.
4. SNAP on Pickup Orders
Hy-Vee opened its pickup lane to SNAP and EBT shoppers in August 2020.
Its Aisles Online pickup orders take SNAP or EBT, and you pick that option at checkout on the website or the app.
At pickup you hand over the EBT card, plus a debit or credit card for anything the benefits don’t cover.
That covered more than 250 stores across the chain’s eight states, Iowa included.
Can you say the same thing about Fareway’s pickup lane?
Fareway takes SNAP food benefits and EBT cards only from in-store shoppers, according to its online shopping FAQ.
If you pay with an EBT card, the pickup lane isn’t open to you.
You push a cart like everyone else.
Psst! How do the two chains stack up side by side? See the full comparison below.
5. Store Size
Fareway keeps building small.
Its Story City store opened in 2024 at 10,800 square feet with fresh-cut produce, a full-service butcher counter, and a bakery that bakes daily.
The Denver store followed in July 2025, and its 15,000 square feet added FastLanes self-checkout to the butcher counter.
Hy-Vee goes a different direction: Its Grimes store, by the company’s announcement, opened at about 93,000 square feet.
Fareway is the shorter walk.
If you’re in and out for pork chops and a gallon of milk, the small store saves you time on your feet.
6. Lunch Inside the Store
At Story City, Fareway skips the food court, and its showpiece is the meat case instead.
The chain promises USDA Choice beef along with pork and chicken it describes as never gassed and never injected.
At Story City, produce and a bakery round out the list, and then you’re at the register.
Hy-Vee’s Park Avenue store in Des Moines, by contrast, stacks a food court on top of the groceries.
Its posted hours cover a Chinese counter, an Italian counter, sushi, and a Starbucks.
A Wine and Spirits shop and a pharmacy that opens on Sundays are on the list too.
You can eat lunch, fill a prescription, and pick up a bottle of wine without going back to your car.
The Story City release names three departments, and none of them serves lunch.
Fareway keeps it to groceries.
7. Self-Checkout Lanes
Fareway has added self-checkout lanes it calls FastLanes at more than 65 of its stores, based mostly on store size.
The new Denver store folded FastLanes self-checkout in alongside its butcher counter and curbside pickup when it opened in July 2025.
Is Hy-Vee moving the same way?
Hy-Vee has been doing the opposite at some of its stores.
Hy-Vee started removing self-checkout lanes at some of its stores in 2024, saying it wanted more face-to-face interaction with shoppers at checkout.
You’ll find a cashier waiting there instead of a kiosk.
Which lane greets you at checkout now depends on which chain you’re standing in.
Psst! How much do you know about Iowa’s grocery history? Take our quiz and see if you can ace it.
Quiz
Iowa Grocery IQ
Answer these questions on Iowa’s grocery chains, past and present. We bet you can’t get them all right. Prove us wrong?
Hy-Vee got its name in 1952 through what?
Where Each Chain Started
Fareway's first store opened at 624 Story Street in Boone on May 12, 1938, according to the company's history page.
Hy-Vee's history page puts its first store in Beaconsfield in 1930, eight years earlier.
Hy-Vee moved its corporate offices to West Des Moines in 1995.
The Fareway name carries three ideas at once: A wide range of fare, the old phrase bill of fare for a grocery list, and treating people fairly.
The founder's granddaughter, P. Sue Beckwith, chairs Fareway's board today.
Hy-Vee puts its ownership in the tagline on its website: "Your employee-owned grocery store."
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