Retail Watchers

http://www.supermarketnews.com/retail-f ... fringement

Wow. Will be interesting to see if anything comes of this.

Good thing Loblaws did not ever sue Kroger for trademark infringement with the first generation version of Private Selection... the PS sure looked a lot like PC...

storewanderer wrote:http://www.supermarketnews.com/retail-f ... fringement

Wow. Will be interesting to see if anything comes of this.

Good thing Loblaws did not ever sue Kroger for trademark infringement with the first generation version of Private Selection... the PS sure looked a lot like PC...

Hypocritical considering how Kroger made a number of closely-resembling generic brands in the early 2000s (think the Aldi brands today but even closer to the real thing right down to similar fonts and slight naming differences).

If anything this shows Kroger sees Lidl as a serious threat, which I'm surprised of, considering seeing how early articles seemed to demonstrate Lidl didn't really understand how the American grocery market of.

I wonder if some of the items at Lidl are sourced through the same suppliers as Kroger which would add more mud to the situation. I have purchased a handfull of PS items that are imported from Italy (pasta), Belgium (cookies), Canada (refrigerated cookies and frozen apple tartlets), France (water), Germany (some kind of frozen pizza on french bread pieces).

pseudo3d wrote:

storewanderer wrote:
If anything this shows Kroger sees Lidl as a serious threat, which I'm surprised of, considering seeing how early articles seemed to demonstrate Lidl didn't really understand how the American grocery market of.

I would think Lidl would be more of a threat to Aldi. In any event, Lidl is entering the Cincinnati market in the coming months. I don't know if that's part of the motivation for the lawsuit but Kroger gets very testy about other chains coming into its home turf.

There are a lot of other things Kroger should focus on. They need to improve quality in bakery/deli. They need to get their out of stock situation in higher volume stores under control too (this seems to be a daytime/swing shift labor allocation problem to the grocery department). These things are what cost Kroger 20-30% of my grocery business and cause me to go elsewhere sometimes.

Well, this one didn't go to well for Kroger:

"Kroger has dropped a federal lawsuit against Lidl that accused the discounter of copying its private brands. The lawsuit and all claims asserted were dismissed with prejudice, meaning the case may not be refiled. Each side agreed to bear its own fees and costs, attorneys for the respective companies said in a filing late last week."

"Judge John A. Gibney Jr. in July denied Kroger’s injunction request and ordered a jury trial, and signaled skepticism of Kroger’s ability to prove its claims: “Although Kroger brings five claims against Lidl, it asserts only two of its counts in support of its motion for a preliminary injunction: trademark infringement and dilution. Kroger fails to show a likelihood of success on the merits for either of its asserted claims.”

http://www.supermarketnews.com/news/kro ... ainst-lidl

I hope Kroger is getting back to the basics of the business and increasing sales.

Last quarter was promising, the lack of long term guidance killed the stock.

Time wasting moves like suing Lidl, things like cutting new store openings due to "deflation," things like remerchandising stores to take away dedicated nutrition aisles, and canceling/delaying remodels on stores that desperately need it "due to deflation" - all moves they made earlier this year, were not good moves.