Dahl's Foods bankruptcy

[kr.abs.swy]

It seems to have happened below the radar, but the Dahl's Foods chain in Des Moines, Iowa, has filed for bankruptcy and the Dahl's name is disappearing from the market.

They announced that they were closing stores in Ankeny and Ames in May 2014. The Ankeny store looks like a new build (it looks very similar to the Ingersoll store in Des Moines). The Ames store was once a Cub Foods. http://www.iowastatedaily.com/business/ ... 002e0.html

Then in August they announced that they were closing a store in West Des Moines. This store was built in 1958. http://www.kcci.com/news/dahls-to-close ... e/27791314.

Then in November, they filed for bankruptcy. This article has the petition embedded: http://whotv.com/2014/11/10/dahls-files ... o-be-sold/

Of the 10 stores they had at bankruptcy, five are converting to Price Chopper, two are converting to Cash Saver, and three are closing. One is to be demolished to make way for a new Kum & Go.

Hy-Vee bought some prescriptions.

It is interesting to note that their problem wasn't that they had a lot of debt. The largest liability was lease agreements ($33 million, out of $41 million in liabilities) to Associated Wholesale Grocers. I believe I read that they had done sale-leasebacks on many of their stores at one point. The bankruptcy petition shows that they owned only two stores: Euclid and Hickman, and the others were capital leases or operating leases.

So it would seem that they either entered into leases that were too expensive and that they couldn't afford any longer, or had fair leases but were poorly managed. I don't know which one it was (or if it was some combination) or if there was some other issue.

5.5 million shares (the vast majority) are listed as being owned by ESOP / 401k trusts. No shares are owned by anyone named Dahl.

They had some nice stores. The Ingersoll store was new and had lots of bells and whistles (they added a gas station after it opened and it had a café area that was actually comfortable to sit in and even had a buffet). Prices seemed to be higher than Hy-Vee, however. I don't know Des Moines well enough to comment on whether they were in good or poor locations.

At least one of the stores was a former Albertsons that, as of 2014, apparently still had the Albertsons Grocery Palace interior: https://www.flickr.com/photos/fourstarc ... 7249780961. Albertsons had a short, and unsuccessful, run in Des Moines.