Retail Watchers

Albertsons must be in Ontario for the long run. The "out" would have been when their roof partially collapsed in the bad winter storm in January 2017.

I look forward to seeing the Waremart model someday. I wonder if the WinCo Foods in Oregon City, Ore. is similar but under the main nameplate.
https://goo.gl/maps/qH82p98UeTWN9rdk9

Albertsons has had a longtime presence in Ontario, and is still fairly close to Boise. I doubt that they will abandon Ontario.

As for that Oregon City WinCo, it looks to be the old Haggen store. Not sure of square footage but they appear to have done a more complete remodel when they moved in than they did in Ontario (where I am surprised that they left Kmart's ceiling, lighting, and air vents mostly intact)

Super S wrote: ↑September 18th, 2019, 6:16 pm Albertsons has had a longtime presence in Ontario, and is still fairly close to Boise. I doubt that they will abandon Ontario.

As for that Oregon City WinCo, it looks to be the old Haggen store. Not sure of square footage but they appear to have done a more complete remodel when they moved in than they did in Ontario (where I am surprised that they left Kmart's ceiling, lighting, and air vents mostly intact)

Volume can only get so low and when a store only has 10-15 shoppers on a weekend in the middle of the afternoon, something has to give. I thought maybe it was a slow shopping time for the town but after what I saw at Wal Mart and Waremart that was definitely not the case. Being in a generally dead retail area does not help the situation any (granted it is like a 5 minute drive from the booming retail area). Perhaps if Target or someone showed up and redeveloped the old mall, it would help bring traffic back to that area of Ontario. The independent Red Apple had a very mixed bag of pricing (which brings me to another point as I was in a few other Associated Food Stores supplied independents as well... I'm not sure what Associated Food Stores is doing with pricing at their independent customers... but it is not nearly as strong as it once was) and for some reason I find the Food Club, etc. lines to be a weaker private label mix than Western Family was. They do not seem to be promoted nearly as heavily either. They seem to "get lost in the shelves" because there are too many labels: Food Club, Simply Done, Top Care, etc. With Western Family it was a single label throughout all categories and it really stood out.

I was really surprised to see that Kmart ceiling in Ontario. They clearly did not spend a ton on remodeling that location but did have to build out refrigeration, meat prep, etc. which I'm sure was very costly. Based on the volume it is doing I think lower start up costs were probably part of the plan for them to get a decent return on investment there.

It appears some of the old Shopko buildings may have better lives than just as climate controlled self storage...
WinCo Foods is renovating the Bend, Ore. storefront and parking lot to open in late 2020.

The company is continuing on, despite concerns locally that the COVID-19 Pandemic may have stalled the grocer's expansion.
https://ktvz.com/news/bend/2020/04/28/w ... struction/

I'm wondering if this goes well if they might look at other former Shopko locations, but this probably also depends on landlords and local market viability.

WinCo also has agreed to locate a new store at a former Shopko location in Eugene, bringing the total to three stores in the greater Eugene area. News reports also show that WinCo plans to open a store in Wenatchee, Washington, in a former Shopko location.

(from an earlier report)

Bend is a large central Oregon community with both local, regional, and tourism commerce. There is not really an off price grocer there currently, the closest might be the warehouse layout Food4Less on the north end of the city.

Do you think they will truck from Boise or Woodburn to supply this location?

Many Shopkos were already near a grocer but they make good WinCos with their size.

WinCo should do well in Bend. The F4L in Bend has skewed a little away from the low price warehouse type of pricing and merchandising and more toward a natural/organic bend at lower prices for those items.

storewanderer wrote: ↑September 27th, 2020, 9:52 pm The F4L in Bend has skewed a little away from the low price warehouse type of pricing and merchandising and more toward a natural/organic bend at lower prices for those items.

SamSpade wrote: ↑September 28th, 2020, 10:48 am

storewanderer wrote: ↑September 27th, 2020, 9:52 pm The F4L in Bend has skewed a little away from the low price warehouse type of pricing and merchandising and more toward a natural/organic bend at lower prices for those items.

Off Topic

Smart niche. Being adjacent the only Trader Joe's for hundreds of miles (and usually the entrance point into the community for those from the west and north), this probably works out well. If anyone's a regular TJ's shopper, you start to learn that they have *most* but not everything on your list so it's usually helpful to stop by a 'big box' grocer or multi-department retailer nearby for anything else, especially in hard lines and HABA items.

I think the Bend F4L operator paid attention to the success of the Ashland Shop N Kart operator who successfully transitioned their store over the years in this manner. Bend isn't quite Ashland and that Bend F4L is a much larger store with more competition but the idea seems to have given them a lifeline there.