Retail Watchers

There is another aspect we've overlooked here. Austin *and* San Antonio once had Kroger locations throughout. So they were trying to reclaim what they once had lost there. Spoiler alert - HEB isn't one to be messed with in their home territory. Florida has never fully had a true Kroger store, so the...

Most of the ones you still see running are of the IBM/Toshiba 4800 and 4900 series. The 4690 is a much older system.

I see a few on this list that are no surprise: Irving Mall, Irving, TX - the last department store in normal mode there. Mall is largely empty Town East Mall, Mesquite, TX - already has the Sears anchor empty; Macy's going would probably continue the fall from grace for this one. Shops at Willow Ben...

A&P operated a 55k square foot food and drug chain in the Southeast called The Family Mart in the 1980s and attempted to re-enter Florida after leaving in the 1970s (link). When they left, Kroger bought them all and converted to Florida Choice, though Kroger left within a year or two. Grand Uni...

Subway is switching to Pepsi for 10 years. Previously the chain used Coke. No more Coke Freestyle machines for Subway. They say Pepsi is cheaper for restaurants, but more people prefer Coke products. https://fox59.com/news/national-world/in-rare-shift-subway-says-its-ditching-coca-cola-products/ Pr...

There were no problems with Albertsons in Florida. Everyone I visited were clean, modern, well staffed and well run. The "problem" was they did not have enough stores to make a difference and for some reason would not build more stores. I think they would have taken W/D to the cleaners IF...

As for acquisitions, I haven't seen any good ones for either company. Maybe Giant Eagle for Albertsons if they divest the gas station business (which accounts for half of the company), and they probably should've considered SEG again after BI-LO vanished and before Aldi bought it...but they need to...

Unless Kroger has a large termination fee owed to Albertsons Section 8.4d of the SEC filing. Kroger is the parent in the agreement: " As used herein, “Company Termination Fee” means a cash amount equal to $318,000,000. As used herein, “Parent Termination Fee” means a cash amount equal to $600,...

Safeway wasn't a lost cause in the divisions it divested I kind of disagree. The Dallas division was plagued with a union instability that was threatening the whole company - not just that division. When you combine that with an older and smaller store base containing mostly in-town, non-suburban s...

That is my impression. The first time I went into one of these decades ago I was blown away by how cheap everything was. Compared to other stores it almost felt like free food. And the quality was above average for generics. The store was orderly and spartan. NOW- the price gap between them and oth...