WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote:
pseudo3d wrote:Let's be clear, unless it's a very specialized, successful grocer with skill in small stores, any retailer would have a tough time making a full-line sub-30k square foot store work, because once you start cramming perishables in (I'm not sure how accurate the newspaper is what with the Starbucks and all), the merchandise mix has to become highly abbreviated. The Fresh Market failed in Texas partly because of this. Remember, Tom Thumb bought two others as well and they haven't closed yet.

EDIT: I should also note that Tom Thumb's problems were compounded by it being below an office tower, not a residential tower.
I disagree. I have seen plenty of retailers do well with smaller stores. Food Lion doesn't necessarily do well, but they have been around far longer than many of their competitors and managed to survive. Safeway has plenty of 25-30K stores on the West coast that have run successfully for years, so if anybody could have pulled it off, Tom Thumb should have been them. A location in an office tower with a large Deli should have been the ideal store, as it would attract a lunch crowd and a late afternoon crowd. The Starbucks should have attracted a morning crowd for coffee. Something else wasn't right for it not to work, but I also know that Albertsons isn't a flexible company when it comes to offerings, and that could have come to haunt them.

Has anyone else heard of other closings beyond this, Denham Springs and Bossier City? I'm wondering if it isn't part of a larger group of closings.
Citing Food Lion and Safeway aren't really good examples. Food Lion has always had small stores, small enough that Food Lion stores rarely get re-tenanted by grocery (I think Brookshire's may have moved into a few stores), only about half of the Houston ones became grocery (of some sort). Safeway OTOH benefits from a lot of stores being grandfathered in, with lasting legacies and areas dense enough to really support it (for example, the Rouses/former A&P is under 10,000 square feet, no way would Rouses or A&P be able to pull that off elsewhere). There's a good reason why stores built these days are over 30,000 square feet with very few exceptions, and this isn't one of them.

Even if it did get office traffic, realistically it can't sustain itself on that alone. A convenience store, sure, but not a full-fledged supermarket. As for closures, this is probably the annual blood-letting from the South division and the South division alone (all divisions face it), although it did close Watauga earlier this year unannounced (maybe a lapsed lease). As an aside, it is a shame that the Randalls (Safeway) management really damaged the Louisiana stores when they were getting back on their feet, if they want a chance to get back into New Orleans via purchasing Winn-Dixie's stores, then Safeway style shenanigans will cause those stores to sink faster than a lead balloon.

You could point out that The Fresh Market survived here for about a year, but remember they closed ALL of their Texas stores, so this one could've been losing money hand over fist before Albertsons purchased it. But if that was the case, then you could make an argument as to why they bought it in the first place. Hmmm....
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by architect »

pseudo3d wrote:
wnetmacman wrote:
pseudo3d wrote:I should also note that Tom Thumb's problems were compounded by it being below an office tower, not a residential tower.
Safeway has plenty of 25-30K stores on the West coast that have run successfully for years, so if anybody could have pulled it off, Tom Thumb should have been them. A location in an office tower with a large Deli should have been the ideal store, as it would attract a lunch crowd and a late afternoon crowd. The Starbucks should have attracted a morning crowd for coffee. Something else wasn't right for it not to work, but I also know that Albertsons isn't a flexible company when it comes to offerings, and that could have come to haunt them.

Has anyone else heard of other closings beyond this, Denham Springs and Bossier City? I'm wondering if it isn't part of a larger group of closings.
Even if it did get office traffic, realistically it can't sustain itself on that alone. A convenience store, sure, but not a full-fledged supermarket. As for closures, this is probably the annual blood-letting from the South division and the South division alone (all divisions face it), although it did close Watauga earlier this year unannounced (maybe a lapsed lease).

You could point out that The Fresh Market survived here for about a year, but remember they closed ALL of their Texas stores, so this one could've been losing money hand over fist before Albertsons purchased it. But if that was the case, then you could make an argument as to why they bought it in the first place. Hmmm....
One key piece of the puzzle for why the Fort Worth store didn't work in this office environment is due to transportation. In West Coast/East Coast urban areas, smaller urban stores in commercial areas are able to be successful due to the fact that most shoppers are either walking, biking or riding mass transit home. This produces a steady after-work shopping crowd. On the other hand, with this closing Fort Worth store, pretty much all employees at the adjacent offices were likely driving to/from work, and thereby passing fuller-featured grocers on the way home. Why stop at an undersized sub-30,000 sq ft. location when you could just as easily shop at a 50,000-60,000 sq ft. store with far better selection?

Also, as far as closures go, grocery movement in the DFW area tends to not make headlines in the media, except in cases where a new grocer is entering the market, a high profile/unique store is opening (such as Central Market), or far-reaching expansion plans are announced (such as Kroger's expansion of ClickList). There are simply too many mainstream grocers for one off closures to garner any attention. As a result, it would not surprise me if more stores are slated to close which we do not yet know about. In particular, I cannot believe that Albertsons and Tom Thumb locations are still operating almost adjacent to one another in both Mesquite and Grand Prairie.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by pseudo3d »

architect wrote:
pseudo3d wrote:
wnetmacman wrote:
Safeway has plenty of 25-30K stores on the West coast that have run successfully for years, so if anybody could have pulled it off, Tom Thumb should have been them. A location in an office tower with a large Deli should have been the ideal store, as it would attract a lunch crowd and a late afternoon crowd. The Starbucks should have attracted a morning crowd for coffee. Something else wasn't right for it not to work, but I also know that Albertsons isn't a flexible company when it comes to offerings, and that could have come to haunt them.

Has anyone else heard of other closings beyond this, Denham Springs and Bossier City? I'm wondering if it isn't part of a larger group of closings.
Even if it did get office traffic, realistically it can't sustain itself on that alone. A convenience store, sure, but not a full-fledged supermarket. As for closures, this is probably the annual blood-letting from the South division and the South division alone (all divisions face it), although it did close Watauga earlier this year unannounced (maybe a lapsed lease).

You could point out that The Fresh Market survived here for about a year, but remember they closed ALL of their Texas stores, so this one could've been losing money hand over fist before Albertsons purchased it. But if that was the case, then you could make an argument as to why they bought it in the first place. Hmmm....
One key piece of the puzzle for why the Fort Worth store didn't work in this office environment is due to transportation. In West Coast/East Coast urban areas, smaller urban stores in commercial areas are able to be successful due to the fact that most shoppers are either walking, biking or riding mass transit home. This produces a steady after-work shopping crowd. On the other hand, with this closing Fort Worth store, pretty much all employees at the adjacent offices were likely driving to/from work, and thereby passing fuller-featured grocers on the way home. Why stop at an undersized sub-30,000 sq ft. location when you could just as easily shop at a 50,000-60,000 sq ft. store with far better selection?

Also, as far as closures go, grocery movement in the DFW area tends to not make headlines in the media, except in cases where a new grocer is entering the market, a high profile/unique store is opening (such as Central Market), or far-reaching expansion plans are announced (such as Kroger's expansion of ClickList). There are simply too many mainstream grocers for one off closures to garner any attention. As a result, it would not surprise me if more stores are slated to close which we do not yet know about. In particular, I cannot believe that Albertsons and Tom Thumb locations are still operating almost adjacent to one another in both Mesquite and Grand Prairie.
I don't think Albertsons would have that many unannounced closures. There's no law that says you can't have the same grocery store across the street from each other, and as long as the Tom Thumb and Albertsons stores don't cannibalize each others' sales, then what's the harm in keeping both open until at least the leases run out?
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:Citing Food Lion and Safeway aren't really good examples. Food Lion has always had small stores, small enough that Food Lion stores rarely get re-tenanted by grocery (I think Brookshire's may have moved into a few stores), only about half of the Houston ones became grocery (of some sort). Safeway OTOH benefits from a lot of stores being grandfathered in, with lasting legacies and areas dense enough to really support it (for example, the Rouses/former A&P is under 10,000 square feet, no way would Rouses or A&P be able to pull that off elsewhere). There's a good reason why stores built these days are over 30,000 square feet with very few exceptions, and this isn't one of them.
Again, I disagree. I'm not referring to the Texas Food Lion failures. I'm referring to the East Coast Food Lion. While they aren't spectacular, they still exist.

Rouses did pull that off elsewhere. Their new store in Lockport, LA is just short of 20,000 square feet, and includes a pharmacy. It's one of the few that does. Royal Street is indeed an anomaly, but a very long lasting one. That store has the full supermarket complement, including a full meat market and full deli. It's the only supermarket within a decent walking distance of the French Quarter.
pseudo3d wrote:Even if it did get office traffic, realistically it can't sustain itself on that alone. A convenience store, sure, but not a full-fledged supermarket. As for closures, this is probably the annual blood-letting from the South division and the South division alone (all divisions face it), although it did close Watauga earlier this year unannounced (maybe a lapsed lease). As an aside, it is a shame that the Randalls (Safeway) management really damaged the Louisiana stores when they were getting back on their feet, if they want a chance to get back into New Orleans via purchasing Winn-Dixie's stores, then Safeway style shenanigans will cause those stores to sink faster than a lead balloon.

You could point out that The Fresh Market survived here for about a year, but remember they closed ALL of their Texas stores, so this one could've been losing money hand over fist before Albertsons purchased it. But if that was the case, then you could make an argument as to why they bought it in the first place. Hmmm....
We still have The Fresh Market in Louisiana. I still think Albertsons bought it to keep others out. I don't see them buying WD because Bi-Lo would need to be part of the deal, and they can't handle that much suck.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote: Again, I disagree. I'm not referring to the Texas Food Lion failures. I'm referring to the East Coast Food Lion. While they aren't spectacular, they still exist.
Those have been shrinking, and with a few exceptions, all the divested stores in the merger have been Food Lion stores. The East Coast stores also tend to live on because of name recognition and less intense competition.
Rouses did pull that off elsewhere. Their new store in Lockport, LA is just short of 20,000 square feet, and includes a pharmacy. It's one of the few that does.
Yes, but other full line departments?
We still have The Fresh Market in Louisiana.
I wouldn't count on it in another year.
I still think Albertsons bought it to keep others out.
If that were really the case, then they wouldn't have invested in them, but realistically who else would want the stores? The bulk of the old Houston stores went to Total Wine, not a grocery retailer.
I don't see them buying WD because Bi-Lo would need to be part of the deal
Not necessarily, companies sell out markets all the time. Even a whole purchase of Winn-Dixie Louisiana Inc. won't include BI-LO.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:
wnetmacman wrote: Again, I disagree. I'm not referring to the Texas Food Lion failures. I'm referring to the East Coast Food Lion. While they aren't spectacular, they still exist.
Those have been shrinking, and with a few exceptions, all the divested stores in the merger have been Food Lion stores. The East Coast stores also tend to live on because of name recognition and less intense competition.
Not the point. The ones still there are still there.
pseudo3d wrote:
Rouses did pull that off elsewhere. Their new store in Lockport, LA is just short of 20,000 square feet, and includes a pharmacy. It's one of the few that does.
Yes, but other full line departments?
It has all the features of a larger store, including Deli, Bakery, full service meats, and the like.
pseudo3d wrote:
We still have The Fresh Market in Louisiana.
I wouldn't count on it in another year.
Unless the company as a whole folds, I would. They do very well here.
pseudo3d wrote:
I still think Albertsons bought it to keep others out.
If that were really the case, then they wouldn't have invested in them, but realistically who else would want the stores? The bulk of the old Houston stores went to Total Wine, not a grocery retailer.
Of course they would have! You have to put lipstick on the pig to make it appealing, plus TFM doesn't merchandise like other full line grocers.
pseudo3d wrote:
I don't see them buying WD because Bi-Lo would need to be part of the deal
Not necessarily, companies sell out markets all the time. Even a whole purchase of Winn-Dixie Louisiana Inc. won't include BI-LO.
If WD Louisiana goes, it won't be to a single operator, because the ones who are here have already cherry-picked out the stores they wanted. A sale of Southeastern Grocers would include Bi-Lo, because they operate WD, Bi-Lo, Harvey's and Fresco Y Mas as one company now. It wouldn't be just one banner.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote: Not the point. The ones still there are still there.
But Tom Thumb still operates the other Fresh Market stores. Why is Food Lion allowed to fail and Albertsons/Tom Thumb isn't?
Of course they would have! You have to put lipstick on the pig to make it appealing, plus TFM doesn't merchandise like other full line grocers.
Point still stands. Kroger hasn't shown interest in any Fresh Market stores even in other markets, and that leaves non-grocers, like maybe CVS or something like Total Wine.
pseudo3d wrote:
If WD Louisiana goes, it won't be to a single operator, because the ones who are here have already cherry-picked out the stores they wanted.
Rouses and Shoppers Value picked up opportunity (flooded stores, dying leases). The New Orleans stores are clearly worth something, but who would take them?

Basically, my point is that despite some significant management issues I can't really fault them for closing this particular store and its odd location, but they need to step up their game if they want to acquire more stores at this point like when Winn-Dixie inevitably pulls out of New Orleans and those stores are up for grabs.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:But Tom Thumb still operates the other Fresh Market stores. Why is Food Lion allowed to fail and Albertsons/Tom Thumb isn't?
That wasn't the point I was making. The comparisons of this single store versus the Texas Food Lion failure are not good ones. FL came in like a lion (pardon the pun), and within three weeks, the stores were deserted thanks to Dateline NBC. Ahold Delhaize is now investing in the remaining FL stores to upgrade them. That can't be all bad, right?

TFM failed out west because of a myriad of issues, including bad distribution channels, poor execution and other factors. This particular store failed because you can only put so much stuff in a building, and then you have to choose a viable location, which TFM hadn't done in the first place. Albertsons appeared to be 'retail squatting'; leasing space to keep the competition out.

pseudo3d wrote:Point still stands. Kroger hasn't shown interest in any Fresh Market stores even in other markets, and that leaves non-grocers, like maybe CVS or something like Total Wine.
Kroger is only interested in building big stores or Ruler Foods stores right now. I wouldn't expect them to have any interest in TFM.
pseudo3d wrote:Rouses and Shoppers Value picked up opportunity (flooded stores, dying leases). The New Orleans stores are clearly worth something, but who would take them?
That's my point; I don't think anybody else wants to go to New Orleans. Albertsons has been there, and massively failed (stores that were supposed to do $100k a day did only $100k a week). A&P and National both had some of their final blows there. Kroger just simply won't go. That only leaves folks like Rouses and Walmart (yup, Walmart) to fill the gaps that the locally owned guys won't pick up. I can tell you that local grocers do far better in New Orleans than a national one, because the local guys take the comments and requests to heart and actually do them, where the bigger ones just kind of shrug and walk away. Albertsons was notoriously non-local during their short lived time there.
pseudo3d wrote:Basically, my point is that despite some significant management issues I can't really fault them for closing this particular store and its odd location, but they need to step up their game if they want to acquire more stores at this point like when Winn-Dixie inevitably pulls out of New Orleans and those stores are up for grabs.
See my comment about Albertsons in NO just above. They won't go back, nor will they be welcomed if they do. Right now, they can't operate a store east of Baton Rouge (save for Hammond; that one survives somehow) successfully. They were all along the I-12 corridor in Covington, Mandeville (twice!), Slidell and Denham Springs (well they're still there for now). Only Hammond has managed to survive, but it's an older store that's established. I'm expecting Rouses to pick up either the WD or Albertsons in Hammond any day, though I think the WD may survive due to the fact that the WD DC (managed by C&S) operates there.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote:
pseudo3d wrote:But Tom Thumb still operates the other Fresh Market stores. Why is Food Lion allowed to fail and Albertsons/Tom Thumb isn't?
That wasn't the point I was making. The comparisons of this single store versus the Texas Food Lion failure are not good ones. FL came in like a lion (pardon the pun), and within three weeks, the stores were deserted thanks to Dateline NBC. Ahold Delhaize is now investing in the remaining FL stores to upgrade them. That can't be all bad, right?

TFM failed out west because of a myriad of issues, including bad distribution channels, poor execution and other factors. This particular store failed because you can only put so much stuff in a building, and then you have to choose a viable location, which TFM hadn't done in the first place. Albertsons appeared to be 'retail squatting'; leasing space to keep the competition out.
If they were squatting, they wouldn't be operating the stores there at all, it would be like H-E-B and old Albertsons/their older stores, or Albertsons and Dominick's.
That's my point; I don't think anybody else wants to go to New Orleans. Albertsons has been there, and massively failed (stores that were supposed to do $100k a day did only $100k a week). A&P and National both had some of their final blows there. Kroger just simply won't go. That only leaves folks like Rouses and Walmart (yup, Walmart) to fill the gaps that the locally owned guys won't pick up. I can tell you that local grocers do far better in New Orleans than a national one, because the local guys take the comments and requests to heart and actually do them, where the bigger ones just kind of shrug and walk away. Albertsons was notoriously non-local during their short lived time there.
The Albertsons in New Orleans was part of the Houston division, which never really connected with customers (the card and the higher prices probably didn't endear New Orleanians to it). The Winn-Dixie stores survive, they even built a store post-Katrina there (one of their fancy late 2000s prototypes). But if they were better managed (which again, now is not the time), they might be able to make it work in New Orleans, but they're going to have to try a lot harder than they are right now. Likewise, the stores east of Baton Rouge were cut as part of the New Orleans/earlier pull-outs, except for Mandeville, which was forced out for Whole Foods, not due to a lack of business.
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Re: WestBend (Fort Worth) Tom Thumb closing after less than a year

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:If they were squatting, they wouldn't be operating the stores there at all, it would be like H-E-B and old Albertsons/their older stores, or Albertsons and Dominick's.
Retail squatting is the practice of holding a lease on a building and not opening it up for anyone. Albertsons and WD are big culprits of it. I believe this will happen here.
pseudo3d wrote:The Albertsons in New Orleans was part of the Houston division, which never really connected with customers (the card and the higher prices probably didn't endear New Orleanians to it). The Winn-Dixie stores survive, they even built a store post-Katrina there (one of their fancy late 2000s prototypes).
For the first part, that wasn't the issue. I don't find that Albertsons connects with the local area regardless of the division, except around Boise.

Albertsons having a card wasn't the problem either. Winn Dixie STILL has a card, though it's part of Plenti now. The store WD built was in a neighborhood where they were once across the street, in a building that was taken over by Home Depot immediately post Katrina, though it has since been redeveloped as Marshalls, Petco and CVS. That store is really nothing special, and it's been around long enough now that the locals see it as like any other WD, and it acts like one too.
pseudo3d wrote:Likewise, the stores east of Baton Rouge were cut as part of the New Orleans/earlier pull-outs, except for Mandeville, which was forced out for Whole Foods, not due to a lack of business.
These stores were Albertsons. I don't care if the Boise division operated them, they failed because they did not serve the local customer! It is a problem that Albertsons has no matter where they are located. Even in Lafayette, where they had been fairly successful, Rouses has taken a good deal of their business because Rouses carries local items religiously, where in Albertsons you practically have to beg for them, and even then they only carry a small selection. Grocers in Louisiana or anywhere else cannot think as the headquarters city. They must think locally, and that's why regional supermarkets continue to survive, even against Walmart with lower prices. Folks would rather pay just a little more for stuff that they know where it originates.

And you can believe what the news channels told you about Mandeville. It was closed because the center operator (Stirling Properties, a Louisiana company) felt that Whole Paycheck Foods could bring higher rent percentages than Albertsons was doing. Rent is more than a flat fee, it's also a percentage of sales. If Albertsons pays 10% of sales, and sales are $1million, (I know this isn't realistic), then rent is $100k. If WFM pays the same 10%, but sales are $3million, then rent is $300k, thus they make a bigger profit. Also, part of the building was split with Forever 21 Red, so they pay part of the rent too.
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