I'm not anybody in the business, but I wouldn't mind someone snapping up Shoppers to actually make a difference. All along, this really seems as if they should compete in the eyes of the beholder. Those who have wound up in the company, of course. What if the SuperValu executives saw overnight success to their stores, placing them on the top-rate grocers list next to Wegmans and Publix? At least maybe they'd want Shoppers to be the way it would be. That also evokes an earlier posts of disintegrating Shoppers for Safeway.mjhale wrote:If Supervalu put Shoppers up for sale who would be buying? Shoppers does have large stores inside the Beltway so they might make sense for someone like Giant or Safeway. Giant could take the Seven Corners store as Safeway has a nearby location. And Safeway could take Potomac Yards since Giant just built a replacement for the Del Ray store close to the lower end of the Potomac Yards developments. However, outside the Beltway becomes a bit more challenging. Giant and Safeway already have stores near most of the existing Shoppers locations. Exceptions I can think of would be the White Flint and Fair City Mall (Fairfax) stores. Kroger is already in town with Harris Teeter and they seem to be going for new construction in "upscale" and transit oriented neighborhoods. There doesn't seem to be a Shoprite owner who wants to take a shot at the Washington DC market as much as I would love one of them to come down here. The only other major grocer who is in expansion mode is Publix. But based on comments elsewhere on Retail Watchers and comments on Flickr photos Publix would not go for an existing union shop. They are non-union, hire their own staff and don't want to be mixed up in a mess over the UFCW claiming a store must continue as union even with a new operator. Publix has told the Martins employees of the stores they are purchasing in Richmond that they must reapply with Publix. No jobs carry over. It has been strongly rumored that Publix is looking towards Northern Virginia as their next stop going north. The ironic thing is that if Publix could get a hold of existing Shoppers locations, without worry over the union and who Publix hires, Publix would be getting stores in solidly middle class, stable neighborhoods. Sure they aren't the super high end places that the image of Publix seems to gravitate towards. However these are neighborhoods that have basically had a triopoly of Giant, Safeway and Shoppers for many years. I would think they would welcome a new and highly regarded grocer to the neighborhood.
Publix, I don't know, maybe they can chomp some stores out, but otherwise, I don't know. Reminds me of a concept my other Flickr buddy made of actually selling Shoppers to Kroger in actuality and using them as a low-price arm (compared to Harris Teeter... ). All as long as the donuts stay.