Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

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pseudo3d
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Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by pseudo3d »

I'm not sure if the family wants to get out of the business, or if renovating their stores to "Market 32" wasn't a great idea after all.

http://m.supermarketnews.com/retail-fin ... le-sources
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by BillyGr »

Not sure (since this article is only partially visible) but one I saw elsewhere (Ames fan club forum) suggest ed a couple things:

1. That it's not sure if this is even true or just a rumor
2. That the 2nd part (about Market 32) may also be true (that they aren't getting the return on those remodels they expected).
3. That Kroger, Tops and Albertsons were mentioned as possibilities as purchasers.
Not sure if any would be interested (given the Albertsons postings here would they even be able to do so?) but with both the recent Acme purchases in southern NY and CT of A&P locations those would connect into the PC locations north and east in those states - also the pending purchases by Tops of several Hannaford/Stop & Shop locations in NY relatively separate from other stores but on the edges of PC territory, and particularly their one store in eastern MA quite far from the rest of the chain but not so far from some of the PC locations...
4. The one unmentioned chain, well known and based farther west in NY state, which has been rumored to have an agreement not to enter PC territory with PC not entering theirs, which has opened a small detached section of stores in eastern MA which the PC footprint would connect to their existing NY locations, which has fairly recently had experience with not only their known super sized stores but still running older, smaller locations in their home areas (as PC still does), which everyone in the PC territories always is hoping will come to the area...
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by pseudo3d »

BillyGr wrote:Not sure (since this article is only partially visible) but one I saw elsewhere (Ames fan club forum) suggest ed a couple things:

1. That it's not sure if this is even true or just a rumor
2. That the 2nd part (about Market 32) may also be true (that they aren't getting the return on those remodels they expected).
3. That Kroger, Tops and Albertsons were mentioned as possibilities as purchasers.
Not sure if any would be interested (given the Albertsons postings here would they even be able to do so?) but with both the recent Acme purchases in southern NY and CT of A&P locations those would connect into the PC locations north and east in those states - also the pending purchases by Tops of several Hannaford/Stop & Shop locations in NY relatively separate from other stores but on the edges of PC territory, and particularly their one store in eastern MA quite far from the rest of the chain but not so far from some of the PC locations...
4. The one unmentioned chain, well known and based farther west in NY state, which has been rumored to have an agreement not to enter PC territory with PC not entering theirs, which has opened a small detached section of stores in eastern MA which the PC footprint would connect to their existing NY locations, which has fairly recently had experience with not only their known super sized stores but still running older, smaller locations in their home areas (as PC still does), which everyone in the PC territories always is hoping will come to the area...
That chain of course would be Wegmans, and even if they are interested (doubt it), the Price Chopper/Market 32 stores have much smaller footprints.
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by pseudo3d »

Unless Golub wanted to liquidate the entire chain (in which we would certainly see Tops and ACME take up the slack), then Kroger would seem like the best candidate, as PC/M32 is a top market share performer in fairly good shape, plus the fact that it's too big for Albertsons or definitely Tops to swallow whole seem to seal it that way. If it was indeed for sale at the right price, I can see Kroger wanting to buy it, unless they were angling for Ahold Delhaize to sell off their U.S. holdings (sans Food Lion) sometime in the next 5 years.
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by wnetmacman »

Here's why you should only trust the source:

Price Chopper-Market 32 Official Disputes Report Of Sale Exploration

Officially, they are NOT for sale.
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by pseudo3d »

It's possible, like in the Brookshire's fiasco (also family owned), that there is probably some in-fighting going on inside the corporate walls. I would bet that there is some sort of thing going in inside Golub, and I find a little suspicious that after news broke of a possible sale, the "official" source says "Deny deny deny Market 32 is going great", which would play into the "coup" theory.

Having read the latest news, here are my thoughts/predictions:
- I definitely think there's something going on inside the company
- What will happen to Price Chopper will continue to be a news item for the next few weeks
- Ultimately, it will blow over and Price Chopper remains independent

That being said, I found it a little strange that they would go for a whole chain rebranding just six months after the Market Bistro concept was completed. Seems too soon.
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:It's possible, like in the Brookshire's fiasco (also family owned), that there is probably some in-fighting going on inside the corporate walls.
The difference here was that there was an official announcement from Brookshire that they were up for sale. The story that broke on Friday with relation to this was noted that it was indeed a rumor.

Family-owned businesses can be like that, I don't disagree. This just went down differently.
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote:
pseudo3d wrote:It's possible, like in the Brookshire's fiasco (also family owned), that there is probably some in-fighting going on inside the corporate walls.
The difference here was that there was an official announcement from Brookshire that they were up for sale. The story that broke on Friday with relation to this was noted that it was indeed a rumor.

Family-owned businesses can be like that, I don't disagree. This just went down differently.
Rumors don't just pop up like that at random. There must be some grain of truth to it, but we may never know the full story...
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by cathandler »

They are looking for an investor or investors to help pay for their Market 32 conversion effort. That would stop short of an outright sale, but the ownership structure of the company could conceivably change. Golub was a non-player in the A&P auction, which indicates to me how much capital and management focus is tied up in the rebannering process.
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Re: Price Chopper/Market 32 for sale

Post by BillyGr »

cathandler wrote:They are looking for an investor or investors to help pay for their Market 32 conversion effort. That would stop short of an outright sale, but the ownership structure of the company could conceivably change. Golub was a non-player in the A&P auction, which indicates to me how much capital and management focus is tied up in the rebannering process.
Although, how much would they have been anyway? The areas that A&P had stores only slightly overlapped the fringes of Price Chopper/Market 32 areas (a few in southern NY, the ones in CT are probably closer to NY than most of the PC locations in the state, maybe some in PA) - PC isn't in NYC, NJ or anywhere south (DE/MD) that A&P still was.

So likely that even if they had bid they wouldn't have gotten much (with someone like Acme being involved in many of the closer stores and willing to bid on a much larger bunch of locations)??
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