ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

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pseudo3d
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ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by pseudo3d »

https://www.abc15.com/news/smart-shoppe ... st-prices-

ABC15 in Phoenix recently compared Winco, Walmart, Fry's, and Safeway with a 15-item checklist. The cheapest was Winco, the most expensive was Safeway, with Walmart and Fry's falling in between (Walmart being the second cheapest). What was curious to me is how close Safeway and Fry's are. Overall, Safeway had a +$5 difference but nothing outrageous like in some cases, and the differences in Safeway certainly would make it the better choice if you lived closer to one than a Fry's (in terms of driving/time).

The big question I have though is why they are different. Recent trends indicate that Safeway/Albertsons is getting better (slowly) and Kroger is getting worse (more noticeable), so are the close prices more of Albertsons/Safeway's willingness to compete or Kroger raising prices in center store?
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by jamcool »

The Safeways on the West side have become dirtier and more understocked since the Albertsons merger. Also, where did Bashas’/Food City end up on this survey?
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by SamSpade »

So, I decided to do this comparison in the Portland, Ore. market.
Attached to the Northwest forum.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by SamSpade »

I have some updated thoughts on this matter after making a grocery order this week. I'll update my own thread on the Northwest forum.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by rwsandiego »

pseudo3d wrote: January 11th, 2018, 9:29 am https://www.abc15.com/news/smart-shoppe ... st-prices-

ABC15 in Phoenix recently compared Winco, Walmart, Fry's, and Safeway with a 15-item checklist. The cheapest was Winco, the most expensive was Safeway, with Walmart and Fry's falling in between (Walmart being the second cheapest). What was curious to me is how close Safeway and Fry's are. Overall, Safeway had a +$5 difference but nothing outrageous like in some cases, and the differences in Safeway certainly would make it the better choice if you lived closer to one than a Fry's (in terms of driving/time).

The big question I have though is why they are different. Recent trends indicate that Safeway/Albertsons is getting better (slowly) and Kroger is getting worse (more noticeable), so are the close prices more of Albertsons/Safeway's willingness to compete or Kroger raising prices in center store?
Living in downtown Phoenix midway between Fry's and Safeway, I choose Safeway because they tend to have the things I want to buy and because their perimeter is better than Fry's. Now that the weather has cooled off I will walk to Fry's for fill-in shopping (the walk to Fry's is more pleasant than the one to Safeway), but the bulk of it will be at Safeway.

One thing that's more important to me than price is quality. Even Kroger's Simple Truth and Private Selections products are inferior to the comparable Safeway items. They tend to use soybean oil, rather than the more expensive olive or sunflower seed oil as I'd expect from premium-priced items, and "organic" corn syrup. Both are still cheaper ingredients for which they are charging a premium price.

You are right, a $5 difference is not that much of a difference, especially for folks who aren't price-sensitive. the closest Winco is at least ten miles from me and the closest Walmart is just godawful.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by arizonaguy »

rwsandiego wrote: November 9th, 2020, 11:13 am
pseudo3d wrote: January 11th, 2018, 9:29 am https://www.abc15.com/news/smart-shoppe ... st-prices-

ABC15 in Phoenix recently compared Winco, Walmart, Fry's, and Safeway with a 15-item checklist. The cheapest was Winco, the most expensive was Safeway, with Walmart and Fry's falling in between (Walmart being the second cheapest). What was curious to me is how close Safeway and Fry's are. Overall, Safeway had a +$5 difference but nothing outrageous like in some cases, and the differences in Safeway certainly would make it the better choice if you lived closer to one than a Fry's (in terms of driving/time).

The big question I have though is why they are different. Recent trends indicate that Safeway/Albertsons is getting better (slowly) and Kroger is getting worse (more noticeable), so are the close prices more of Albertsons/Safeway's willingness to compete or Kroger raising prices in center store?
Living in downtown Phoenix midway between Fry's and Safeway, I choose Safeway because they tend to have the things I want to buy and because their perimeter is better than Fry's. Now that the weather has cooled off I will walk to Fry's for fill-in shopping (the walk to Fry's is more pleasant than the one to Safeway), but the bulk of it will be at Safeway.

One thing that's more important to me than price is quality. Even Kroger's Simple Truth and Private Selections products are inferior to the comparable Safeway items. They tend to use soybean oil, rather than the more expensive olive or sunflower seed oil as I'd expect from premium-priced items, and "organic" corn syrup. Both are still cheaper ingredients for which they are charging a premium price.

You are right, a $5 difference is not that much of a difference, especially for folks who aren't price-sensitive. the closest Winco is at least ten miles from me and the closest Walmart is just godawful.
I live within 10 minutes of at least one Walmart, Safeway, SuperTarget, WinCo, Fry's, and Bashas'.

I find I shop Safeway the most. My local Safeway has friendly employees and Safeway's recent sale flyers beat Fry's. Safeway does also seem to have higher quality perimeters.

For national brands I do feel Target and Walmart get the job done.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by storewanderer »

arizonaguy wrote: November 9th, 2020, 4:10 pm

I live within 10 minutes of at least one Walmart, Safeway, SuperTarget, WinCo, Fry's, and Bashas'.

I find I shop Safeway the most. My local Safeway has friendly employees and Safeway's recent sale flyers beat Fry's. Safeway does also seem to have higher quality perimeters.

For national brands I do feel Target and Walmart get the job done.
Kroger in its current state reminds me of that gas station of some middle tier brand that never has the best price (but never the worst price either), doesn't have the nicest facility (but not the worst facility either), and is a brand of gas that does little to nothing to market itself as a quality gasoline. No longer much of a compelling reason to go there given how run down the stores have become and how the pricing is no longer what it used to be. What will be interesting to see is how long they can continue to pull in high customer counts who are used to how they were 3-5 years ago (cleaner stores, more orderly, better merchandising, way better pricing relative to competitors, and efforts being made to improve the quality of products). Everything about Kroger's operation has run down except its private label program which I still find to be excellent and superior to all competitors in mix, offering, and overall price.

Safeway/Albertsons have pricing issues but run circles around Kroger on quality. Safeway/Albertsons has either decreased pricing or kept pricing the same while Kroger has been increasing prices and running increasingly less and less competitive promotions.

The other night when I went to Smiths and sat in my car for 20 minutes before going inside in below 30 degree weather scrolling through this week's 500+ digital offers on my phone, multiple times, I was about to just say screw this and not even go into that store at all and just get what I needed at Wal Mart, WinCo, Sprouts, and Raleys where I just walk in, select my items, pay, and go with a simple easy transaction. Kroger's "digital" offer platform is terrible and out of control. And they will have 4-5 different digital coupons for items in the same promotion- yet more hassle to the customer and more crap to scroll through. Safeway always grouped all items in the same promotion in the same offer at least. At this point you need those offers just to get what the sale prices used to be from simply using the loyalty card. This is worse than Safeway was at its very worst before the Albertsons merger.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by storewanderer »

rwsandiego wrote: November 9th, 2020, 11:13 am

One thing that's more important to me than price is quality. Even Kroger's Simple Truth and Private Selections products are inferior to the comparable Safeway items. They tend to use soybean oil, rather than the more expensive olive or sunflower seed oil as I'd expect from premium-priced items, and "organic" corn syrup. Both are still cheaper ingredients for which they are charging a premium price.
What Simple Truth items have you seen using Soybean Oil when Safeway is using Olive or Sunflower Oil in the comparable item? I am curious because I find Simple Truth's labels to be very clean and have not seen this. I find the Simple Truth items to be excellent quality and clean labels, a step up from the regular private label items of any chain. I also find the pricing of the Simple Truth items to be very competitive. These items seem to be promoted moderately and also sell well.

Private Selection, I agree- those labels are far from clean and far from "premium." That is a brand that probably needs to be cleaned up and then phased out. As in, clean up the labels, re-brand the new clean labels as Simple Truth, discontinue the not so clean labels, and move on. This is a brand that is under-promoted, over-priced, and slow moving.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by rwsandiego »

storewanderer wrote: November 9th, 2020, 6:05 pm
rwsandiego wrote: November 9th, 2020, 11:13 am

One thing that's more important to me than price is quality. Even Kroger's Simple Truth and Private Selections products are inferior to the comparable Safeway items. They tend to use soybean oil, rather than the more expensive olive or sunflower seed oil as I'd expect from premium-priced items, and "organic" corn syrup. Both are still cheaper ingredients for which they are charging a premium price.
What Simple Truth items have you seen using Soybean Oil when Safeway is using Olive or Sunflower Oil in the comparable item?...
Pasta sauce. All of the Simple Truth Organic pasta sauces used soybean oil, while O-Organics used olive oil, the last time I checked about 6 - 8 months ago. As I recall, the Simple Truth Organic preserves also used corn syrup (not high-fructose, though) where O-Organics used cane sugar.
storewanderer wrote: November 9th, 2020, 6:05 pm... I am curious because I find Simple Truth's labels to be very clean and have not seen this. I find the Simple Truth items to be excellent quality and clean labels, a step up from the regular private label items of any chain. I also find the pricing of the Simple Truth items to be very competitive. These items seem to be promoted moderately and also sell well....
Soybean oil is not necessarily a "non-clean" ingredient. My complaint is they are selling a supposedly premium product that uses cheap ingredients. Likewise, corn syrup (as long as it isn't high-fructose) is simply a sugar syrup made from corn, but it is a cheap processed ingredient. To be fair, I have the same complaint with Whole Foods, although they are not using as much soybean oil as they did in the past.
storewanderer wrote: November 9th, 2020, 6:05 pm... Private Selection, I agree- those labels are far from clean and far from "premium." That is a brand that probably needs to be cleaned up and then phased out. As in, clean up the labels, re-brand the new clean labels as Simple Truth, discontinue the not so clean labels, and move on. This is a brand that is under-promoted, over-priced, and slow moving.
Private Selection, like the old Safeway Select, products were unusual and "fancy" when the line was launched. Now, Michigan cherry preserves, sun-dried tomatoes, and similar ingredients are commonplace. If I was Kroger, I'd do what Safeway did and ditch the "Kroger" brand and replace it with "Private Selections." Selling "Kroger" at non-Kroger banners is just silly. If they think "Kroger" has brand equity in California or Arizona, they are dead wrong.

But back to the topic, I agree that Safeway is often more expensive (albeit marginally) than Fry's. For me, the convenience and better-quality produce and meat is worth the few extra dollars. Same thing was true in San Diego. Once Kroger dumbed-down Ralphs there was no reason to shop there. VONS was down the street and had better quality fresh foods.
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Re: ABC15's Phoenix comparisons

Post by storewanderer »

rwsandiego wrote: November 9th, 2020, 9:14 pm
Pasta sauce. All of the Simple Truth Organic pasta sauces used soybean oil, while O-Organics used olive oil, the last time I checked about 6 - 8 months ago. As I recall, the Simple Truth Organic preserves also used corn syrup (not high-fructose, though) where O-Organics used cane sugar.
They may have changed something because some of the pasta sauces use no Soybean but use Organic Extra Virgin Oilve Oil now:
https://www.kroger.com/p/simple-truth-o ... 1111008499
https://www.kroger.com/p/simple-truth-o ... 1111083621
Then this one still has the soybean...
https://www.kroger.com/p/simple-truth-o ... 1111083620

They did recently change the source of the Simple Truth and Private Selection Preserves: it is not even a USA Product anymore. It is from Belgium or somewhere. I can't speak for the quality as I have not purchased either product since the supply change.
These have cane sugar now.
https://www.kroger.com/p/simple-truth-o ... 1111083884
https://www.kroger.com/p/simple-truth-o ... 1111083914

I think at this point in time the Kroger brand has solid value as a private label brand. It has been in use at some of these outlying divisions for 20-25 years now. I think Ralphs and Fred Meyer probably should have kept their own private label given their store count and volume, and they did for a lot longer than the other divisions. Both also historically had very strong private label programs of their own. Converting to PS would not make sense, given PS brand does not appear to have much of an image at all and I don't think it has ever gained much traction anywhere.

The Signature Select brand is a work in progress at best. I'll stop short at calling it a failure, because it is not exactly that. It is just rather confused. Multiple turnovers in the people running private brands at Albertsons in the past few years are probably to blame for this. Previously a brand for premium quality items, now slapped on everything from premium items to cheap frozen breakfast sandwiches and transparent tape. Slapped on multiple frozen pizza based items (one of which used to be the premium Safeway item but after 3 supplier changes in the last couple years, I don't know anymore) so you can't really tell what item is premium and what item (like the mini pizzas, maybe discontinued already) should say Value Corner based on how lousy it tastes unless you guess based on the price. A logo that looks like a blatant copy of Essential Everyday (probably no surprise given it had to replace Essential Everyday in 800+ stores from Supervalu), and a brand that is frequently priced above national brand items and rarely price promoted with strong price promotions with national brands instead being favored for such promotions. Signature Reserve brand is already a failure with a lot of the line discontinued. O Organics and Lucerne seem to be holding up okay. Open Nature is another confused brand that isn't gaining much traction. Value Corner should just be discontinued as Kroger finally did with its "value" based brands for the most part (maybe a few are still left)- these are middle-upper middle class stores, no use selling that type of junk.

I really think strong private labels are a key reason why Kroger is holding its customers despite what is an ongoing declining in-store experience. I look into the carts of shoppers at Smiths- lots and lots of private label items in those baskets. Far more than I see at Safeway where private label items do not move nearly as well (they have some success with the Lucerne and O Organics... the "Signature" stuff, not so much). The baskets at Smiths are much more full than the baskets at Safeway as well but that is nothing new.
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