"best meat", and "best cooking school." Zagat's Marketplace Survey also rated Bristol Farms as the number one market in overall quality and service; their stores were described as "a shopper's beautiful dream with wide aisles, helpful staff, and beautiful presentations."

Bristol Farms was named after a street in West Los Angeles, and the word "Farms" was added to emphasize freshness, homemade quality and a warm glow of simple pleasures. The first store in Rolling Hills Estates is relatively small at only 17,800 square feet; it was followed four years later by a larger store in South Pasadena (22,500 square feet). The Manhattan Beach Bristol Farms, still larger at 33,900 square feet, opened in 1991 with a catering facility and cooking school. Bristol Farms opened a store in Ventura County at Westlake Village in November 1996. Bristol Farms entered the fast growing Orange County market during the summer of 1998 in Newport Beach. In June of 1999, their company acquired a small store that was a Hollywood landmark, Chalet Gourmet, and brought it into the Bristol Farms family. Soon after the opening of the Hollywood location, they opened a store in Westwood. In November of 2000, Bristol Farms opened a store at the site of the former Chasen's restaurant that serves the Beverly Hills and West Los Angeles areas. This location incorporates many of the design elements that made Chasen's a hallowed place in the lore of "Old Hollywood". 2006 brought another 40% growth in size and sales for Bristol Farms with the openings of thier Westchester, La Jolla, San Francisco and Palm Desert stores. In August of 2013, they opened the doors to their newest location in the community of Santa Monica. Each store has a unique and distinct feel designed to facilitate the communities they are in and have been great additions to the Bristol Farms family.