Kroger to merge with Albertsons?

[retailfanmitchell019]

8 distribution centers, along with 2 offices, and 5 Albertsons store brands are sold as part of the deal.
So, in effect, C&S is the “SpinCo”.
Only 5 store brands are being divested: Debi Lily, Primo Taglio, Open Nature, ReadyMeals, and Waterfront Bistro. Why can’t they give C&S Signature brands? Selling Best Yet and Topco brands in Albertsons stores will confuse customers.
Reminds me of Fred’s plan during the aborted Walgreens-Rite Aid merger to buy 865 stores. That deal was nullified. I still think the Feds will clamp down on this deal. History repeats itself.

Where’s the list of 413 stores being sold?

[marshd1000]

Yikes.

- 28 stores between Texas and Louisiana seems pretty low.
- Do they take the urban QFC stores, or just the brand name?
- West Coast numbers seem a bit low.
- There are 44 Mariano's stores and C&S is taking only 14. Are they going to sell others or just convert them to Jewel-Osco?

28 stores in Texas and Louisiana covers only the overlap - I would suspect that both Lake Charles stores, Alexandria and Shreveport are in the divestiture list in LA, but not Lafayette and Baton Rouge, as there is no overlap there, and some of the remaining Randalls and Tom Thumb stores in TX. I do not expect many of the Texas divestitures or any Louisiana to be from Kroger stores, owing to condition and age - Kroger has the newer and better maintained store fleet. I would also expect any Texas DC from Albertsons to go to C&S as well.

I believe there is a ton of overlap in the PNW with QFC. They will get the whole chain.

The west coast is where C&S is weaker. I would expect that they would take fewer stores there.

I would expect the 14 sold Mariano's to stay with that name, and the remaining to be rebranded. Jewel Osco is quite powerful in Chicagoland.

I'm sure the vast majority of QFC will go to C&S with possibly two exceptions. One would be the Broadway Market store. That store has a high amount of general merchandise for a QFC. In fact, before it was announced that QFC was going in there, plans were for that space to be an expanded Fred Meyer. I see this going back to Fred Meyer. The other possibly might be the flagship store at University Village. The adjacent Safeway is gone so Kroger might want to keep that store. Maybe it will become something like "Safeway Market Street", "Safeway Northwest Fresh" or might we see a Haggen there? given that there are only 59 QFC's in Washington and the total number of divestitures in Washington is 104 stores, I think we will see the QFC banner go into Eastern Washington and further into Oregon possibly? Bellingham has two Fred Meyer stores, four Haggen stores and one Safeway. I can see two of the Haggens and the one Safeway going to C&S and becoming QFC. Also in Alaska, they are getting rid of 14 Albertsons Co stores. So all the Carrs, which are mostly around Anchorage. I can also see the two Safeways in Fairbanks going to C&S plus the one in Juneau with them becoming Carrs. I see Safeway surviving where there is no Fred Meyer in Alaska!

[SamSpade]

Where’s the list of 413 stores being sold?

Rumor from BoiseDev news/blog site is that it will be released after today's Kroger earnings call.

[arizonaguy]

Most of the Arizona sites are branded Safeway. Outside of Phoenix and Tucson, Albertsons is nonexistent. Plus the whole Safeway union/Albertsons nonunion situation in Arizona.

There are 30 Albertsons stores currently in Arizona.

My guess is that 24 of them get sold to C&S and 6 become either Fry's, Safeway or Smith's stores (or get sold in the potential additional 237 stores to be sold).

I doubt any Fry's or Safeway bannered stores are involved in this C&S sale at this time.

[ClownLoach]

OMG....................and Holy Cxxx!

And perhaps 237 more stores. Looks like CLOWN was spot on again.

I wonder if Pavilions in West Hollywood will be Pavilions by Ralphs, Pavilions by Kroger or Ralphs Fresh Fare.

And what will the eventually merged company do with all the Ralphs in my area that look like cxxx hosted by nasty angry employees?

Notice that the ACI stores are dumped regardless. Anything Kroger would release to C&S only happens if the merger closes...
Edit, the press release has been clarified. Nothing sells to C&S unless Kroger and Albertsons are allowed to merge. So this deal is contingent on the main deal. It isn't a straight dump of unwanted ACI stores.

Basically we just brought back Albertsons and Albertsons LLC.

And that last minute opposition from the Teamsters got a resounding "well then, the hell with you!" from Rodney as he obviously tore up the "no facility closures, sales etc." promise that was intended to get their support.

I'm going to laugh when the Vons in Murrieta becomes Albertsons and the Albertsons across the street becomes Vons.

[arizonaguy]

OMG....................and Holy Cxxx!

And perhaps 237 more stores. Looks like CLOWN was spot on again.

I wonder if Pavilions in West Hollywood will be Pavilions by Ralphs, Pavilions by Kroger or Ralphs Fresh Fare.

And what will the eventually merged company do with all the Ralphs in my area that look like cxxx hosted by nasty angry employees?

Notice that the ACI stores are dumped regardless. Anything Kroger would release to C&S only happens if the merger closes...

Basically we just brought back Albertsons and Albertsons LLC.

I'm going to laugh when the Vons in Murrieta becomes Albertsons and the Albertsons across the street becomes Vons.

I didn't read it the same way. The way I saw it is that Kroger (as the owner of ACI stores and their own) would dump these stores to C&S as part of the conclusion of the merger.

The most interesting thing is that they are NOT dumping King's and Balducci's stores to C&S. I thought that these would be the perfect candidates to dump.

[ClownLoach]

OMG....................and Holy Cxxx!

And perhaps 237 more stores. Looks like CLOWN was spot on again.

I wonder if Pavilions in West Hollywood will be Pavilions by Ralphs, Pavilions by Kroger or Ralphs Fresh Fare.

And what will the eventually merged company do with all the Ralphs in my area that look like cxxx hosted by nasty angry employees?

Notice that the ACI stores are dumped regardless. Anything Kroger would release to C&S only happens if the merger closes...

Basically we just brought back Albertsons and Albertsons LLC.

I'm going to laugh when the Vons in Murrieta becomes Albertsons and the Albertsons across the street becomes Vons.

I didn't read it the same way. The way I saw it is that Kroger (as the owner of ACI stores and their own) would dump these stores to C&S as part of the conclusion of the merger.

The most interesting thing is that they are NOT dumping King's and Balducci's stores to C&S. I thought that these would be the perfect candidates to dump.

I read it as specifically the Kroger stores being sold would be released at the time of the merger. That would imply if the merger is squashed by the FTC that Kroger would keep all their sites. All the stores go to C&S only once the KR and ACI deal closes. Not what I read before.

I also think the wording of the additional 237 stores indicates that Save Mart has bowed out of acquiring stores officially.

The licensing of the Albertsons name is very convenient as it's going to make things easier when C&S goes belly up like Haggen did, and Kroger reacquires the stores in the bankruptcy asset sale. Because you know it's going to happen.

[ClownLoach]

Also BoiseDev has confirmed Spinco is dead. As predicted.

[babs]

Yikes.

- 28 stores between Texas and Louisiana seems pretty low.
- Do they take the urban QFC stores, or just the brand name?
- West Coast numbers seem a bit low.
- There are 44 Mariano's stores and C&S is taking only 14. Are they going to sell others or just convert them to Jewel-Osco?

28 stores in Texas and Louisiana covers only the overlap - I would suspect that both Lake Charles stores, Alexandria and Shreveport are in the divestiture list in LA, but not Lafayette and Baton Rouge, as there is no overlap there, and some of the remaining Randalls and Tom Thumb stores in TX. I do not expect many of the Texas divestitures or any Louisiana to be from Kroger stores, owing to condition and age - Kroger has the newer and better maintained store fleet. I would also expect any Texas DC from Albertsons to go to C&S as well.

I believe there is a ton of overlap in the PNW with QFC. They will get the whole chain.

The west coast is where C&S is weaker. I would expect that they would take fewer stores there.

I would expect the 14 sold Mariano's to stay with that name, and the remaining to be rebranded. Jewel Osco is quite powerful in Chicagoland.

I'm sure the vast majority of QFC will go to C&S with possibly two exceptions. One would be the Broadway Market store. That store has a high amount of general merchandise for a QFC. In fact, before it was announced that QFC was going in there, plans were for that space to be an expanded Fred Meyer. I see this going back to Fred Meyer. The other possibly might be the flagship store at University Village. The adjacent Safeway is gone so Kroger might want to keep that store. Maybe it will become something like "Safeway Market Street", "Safeway Northwest Fresh" or might we see a Haggen there? given that there are only 59 QFC's in Washington and the total number of divestitures in Washington is 104 stores, I think we will see the QFC banner go into Eastern Washington and further into Oregon possibly? Bellingham has two Fred Meyer stores, four Haggen stores and one Safeway. I can see two of the Haggens and the one Safeway going to C&S and becoming QFC. Also in Alaska, they are getting rid of 14 Albertsons Co stores. So all the Carrs, which are mostly around Anchorage. I can also see the two Safeways in Fairbanks going to C&S plus the one in Juneau with them becoming Carrs. I see Safeway surviving where there is no Fred Meyer in Alaska!

The Broadway Market store was a Fred Meyer before it was rebranded to QFC. I agree that they might keep that store and University Village but I think both could become Fred Meyer stores.

[ClownLoach]

28 stores in Texas and Louisiana covers only the overlap - I would suspect that both Lake Charles stores, Alexandria and Shreveport are in the divestiture list in LA, but not Lafayette and Baton Rouge, as there is no overlap there, and some of the remaining Randalls and Tom Thumb stores in TX. I do not expect many of the Texas divestitures or any Louisiana to be from Kroger stores, owing to condition and age - Kroger has the newer and better maintained store fleet. I would also expect any Texas DC from Albertsons to go to C&S as well.

I believe there is a ton of overlap in the PNW with QFC. They will get the whole chain.

The west coast is where C&S is weaker. I would expect that they would take fewer stores there.

I would expect the 14 sold Mariano's to stay with that name, and the remaining to be rebranded. Jewel Osco is quite powerful in Chicagoland.

I'm sure the vast majority of QFC will go to C&S with possibly two exceptions. One would be the Broadway Market store. That store has a high amount of general merchandise for a QFC. In fact, before it was announced that QFC was going in there, plans were for that space to be an expanded Fred Meyer. I see this going back to Fred Meyer. The other possibly might be the flagship store at University Village. The adjacent Safeway is gone so Kroger might want to keep that store. Maybe it will become something like "Safeway Market Street", "Safeway Northwest Fresh" or might we see a Haggen there? given that there are only 59 QFC's in Washington and the total number of divestitures in Washington is 104 stores, I think we will see the QFC banner go into Eastern Washington and further into Oregon possibly? Bellingham has two Fred Meyer stores, four Haggen stores and one Safeway. I can see two of the Haggens and the one Safeway going to C&S and becoming QFC. Also in Alaska, they are getting rid of 14 Albertsons Co stores. So all the Carrs, which are mostly around Anchorage. I can also see the two Safeways in Fairbanks going to C&S plus the one in Juneau with them becoming Carrs. I see Safeway surviving where there is no Fred Meyer in Alaska!

The Broadway Market store was a Fred Meyer before it was rebranded to QFC. I agree that they might keep that store and University Village but I think both could become Fred Meyer stores.

I agree there's no way they'll give up either of those stores. They're probably in the top 1% of Kroger store volumes. University Village could get branded something like Fred Meyer Marketplace.

I think it will be very interesting to see what the divestitures look like once we can compare to some of the odd banner changes that have occurred more recently, like some of the odd Albertsons to Safeway, and Pavilions to Vons, Vons to Pavilions, and even the one Albertsons to Pavilions. The licensing of the Albertsons brand also explains the rushed remodels (which in most cases were just cheap signage change outs) of all the remaining "premium fresh and healthy" Albertsons decor since the stores were covered in their clover logo that would otherwise have to be ripped off the walls once the licensing deal closes and the stores rebanner. Much easier now with their generic unbranded decor to just change the sign outside and call it a day.

One market I'm really interested in seeing is Central California where Albertsons is the dominant brand with the highest volume stores, best review ratings etc. Vons has almost disappeared and Ralphs has flippantly ignored the area for a long time with very subpar stores. The Ralphs brand is poison there. Since they have to rebrand from Albertsons under this deal, I wonder if they will decide to use Safeway north of Santa Barbara? There's arguably just as many NorCal transplants there as SoCal, so Safeway makes the most sense as it isn't as tainted as Vons or Ralphs there. There might be one or two "acceptable" Vons there (Grover Beach? Maybe SLO although that store garners lots of complaints in reviews). I'm sure this is an area where the Ralphs branded stores will be dispatched, like the SLO location on Madonna Rd.

BoiseDev was told no list today or anytime soon. But I'm sure it'll have to come out in regulatory filings soon.

In California it should become very easy to figure out which stores are going to C&S because of the liquor license postings which will have to go up very soon in the front windows. They'll have to go up on every ACI owned store, but the acquirer will obviously be different whether it's Kroger or C&S. I would expect these would need to go up very soon.