Pavilions Long Beach converting to Vons

[storewanderer]

Some Google Review seems to allude it will change to Vons in September.

Maybe the store is one to be divested so they have decided to not proceed with rebranding on those grounds. That nearby Vons that you think is a better divest has a fuel station. Really the best divest there is the Ralphs. But perhaps for Kroger the cool move here would be to divest the Pavilions, then keep the Vons+fuel and that marginal Ralphs that are closer together. Of course since no stores will close "as a result of the merger" I won't speculate further on what would happen in that scenario. We know how Kroger loves fuel stations... and Save Mart and Raleys do not do fuel stations. Save Mart sold its few fuel stations which were all kiosk operations with no store very cheaply built one from Albertsons and a handfull from F4L Fleming to PC&F (now United/Rocket) and Raleys sold its fuel stations all but one of which Raleys spent very big top dollar money developing, to Anabi.

[ClownLoach]

Some Google Review seems to allude it will change to Vons in September.

Maybe the store is one to be divested so they have decided to not proceed with rebranding on those grounds. That nearby Vons that you think is a better divest has a fuel station. Really the best divest there is the Ralphs. But perhaps for Kroger the cool move here would be to divest the Pavilions, then keep the Vons+fuel and that marginal Ralphs that are closer together. Of course since no stores will close "as a result of the merger" I won't speculate further on what would happen in that scenario. We know how Kroger loves fuel stations... and Save Mart and Raleys do not do fuel stations. Save Mart sold its few fuel stations which were all kiosk operations with no store very cheaply built one from Albertsons and a handfull from F4L Fleming to PC&F (now United/Rocket) and Raleys sold its fuel stations all but one of which Raleys spent very big top dollar money developing, to Anabi.

Until now when they've converted from Pavilions to Vons the first step is the rebrand, then they do a light remodel of the store usually just painting with the same decor in place. Lakewood, Anaheim Hills and Westminster went that way so they have had a pretty consistent pattern for these banner changes going back over a decade.

The fact is that the banner change didn't happen, and the store is surrounded by a older than normal clientele that has plenty of time to write letters to the CEO, harass the Store Manager, etc. and write paranoid reviews convinced that if the sign changes then they'll switch sourcing to rotten meat and spoiled milk as seen recently. So ultimately they save money by not changing the brand, the store is a "higher tier" store in the minds of its change-adverse customers even though it was downgraded to Vons decor and fixtures over a decade ago. Because the other nearby Vons stores are subpar the customer perception in the market is that Vons is a significant downgrade when in reality this has just been a much better operated Vons (with a different sign) to begin with. If they hadn't pissed off the neighborhood with the Albertsons down the street that got the most awful year long remodel of all time (which gave them triple split aisles with half the typical lighting of a "Premium fresh and healthy" decor) then sold to Haggen - I'd say they should rebrand this unit to Albertsons if they want to do something different.

There is no logical reason to rebrand in September when the store has sat for 6 months since remodeling. And now they've added Harris Ranch and See's Candies which I haven't seen in other Pavilions, it wouldn't make sense to add new amenities with the intention of removal in three or four months.

The Traffic Circle Ralphs and Vons are on opposite corners from each other. No way they'll be able to keep both as they're textbook overlaps. They spent a lot of money expanding the Ralphs not too long ago, but then Vons also expanded about 15 years ago when the fuel center was added. The Vons for some reason gets bombarded with college students buying beer by the cart load and seems to attract a lower end clientele vs the Ralphs. But the Ralphs doesn't have the greatest parking. The Ralphs is consistently busy and their 2nd highest volume in Long Beach, Marina Pacifica is their top store (I can't believe it's nearly been 30 years since it opened now, time flies). The Vons fuel center doesn't do very much business and is pretty small, 7 pumps. Not enough room for a real convenience store, it's really like the stations they used to build in the 80s with a little room with one Coke cooler and a rack of oil. Lots of customer fights over one way access to the pumps which starts on the less logical side of the station for fire ingress/egress; I used to fill up there before Costco added a station in Signal Hill and I observed a fistfight when a guy cut a line of a dozen cars by entering on the more logical entry side despite "do not enter" signage on the island. It's a pretty well hated gas station.

[storewanderer]

Until now when they've converted from Pavilions to Vons the first step is the rebrand, then they do a light remodel of the store usually just painting with the same decor in place. Lakewood, Anaheim Hills and Westminster went that way so they have had a pretty consistent pattern for these banner changes going back over a decade.

The fact is that the banner change didn't happen, and the store is surrounded by a older than normal clientele that has plenty of time to write letters to the CEO, harass the Store Manager, etc. and write paranoid reviews convinced that if the sign changes then they'll switch sourcing to rotten meat and spoiled milk as seen recently. So ultimately they save money by not changing the brand, the store is a "higher tier" store in the minds of its change-adverse customers even though it was downgraded to Vons decor and fixtures over a decade ago. Because the other nearby Vons stores are subpar the customer perception in the market is that Vons is a significant downgrade when in reality this has just been a much better operated Vons (with a different sign) to begin with. If they hadn't pissed off the neighborhood with the Albertsons down the street that got the most awful year long remodel of all time (which gave them triple split aisles with half the typical lighting of a "Premium fresh and healthy" decor) then sold to Haggen - I'd say they should rebrand this unit to Albertsons if they want to do something different.

There is no logical reason to rebrand in September when the store has sat for 6 months since remodeling. And now they've added Harris Ranch and See's Candies which I haven't seen in other Pavilions, it wouldn't make sense to add new amenities with the intention of removal in three or four months.

The Traffic Circle Ralphs and Vons are on opposite corners from each other. No way they'll be able to keep both as they're textbook overlaps. They spent a lot of money expanding the Ralphs not too long ago, but then Vons also expanded about 15 years ago when the fuel center was added. The Vons for some reason gets bombarded with college students buying beer by the cart load and seems to attract a lower end clientele vs the Ralphs. But the Ralphs doesn't have the greatest parking. The Ralphs is consistently busy and their 2nd highest volume in Long Beach, Marina Pacifica is their top store (I can't believe it's nearly been 30 years since it opened now, time flies). The Vons fuel center doesn't do very much business and is pretty small, 7 pumps. Not enough room for a real convenience store, it's really like the stations they used to build in the 80s with a little room with one Coke cooler and a rack of oil. Lots of customer fights over one way access to the pumps which starts on the less logical side of the station for fire ingress/egress; I used to fill up there before Costco added a station in Signal Hill and I observed a fistfight when a guy cut a line of a dozen cars by entering on the more logical entry side despite "do not enter" signage on the island. It's a pretty well hated gas station.

I agree it does not make sense why they would wait until September to rebrand. Do you know if they've done a grand reopening under the Pavilions banner?

Keeping both of the traffic circle stores (and closing no stores "as a result of the merger") and divesting this Pavilions instead is how you rule the grocery operation at the traffic circle. They could easily close one of the two traffic circle stores but retain that gas station. But in the event of a divest situation that traffic circle Vons is the store to go, there is no question. I am actually expecting them to argue none of those 3 stores need to be divested. Whether or not they can win said argument is another story. They may also be trying to play UFCW here to try and get UFCW in the (divest fewer stores to ensure more of our employees remain with the stable giant merged Kroger) mode too here. No telling what is happening behind closed doors.

That Vons fuel station is a standard Safeway gas station prototype. That was prototype 2 for Safeway fuel (prototype 1 was like a standard scratch built Kroger fuel station with a kiosk in the middle that the customer could not enter and paid through a bank like drawer) in an effort to sell more beverages out of the fuel stations by allowing customers inside the little building to select items. They don't all have the store/booth in the space where another pump should be like Long Beach (some do though), but that little store/booth that you can walk into with hardly any items against the two walls they have in there is identical to the store with walk in access that I've seen at many, many Safeway fuel centers. This includes Safeway fuel centers in places like Granite Bay, CA; Chico, CA; Roseville, CA (Douglas); Pleasanton, CA; some in WA/Canada as well. Safeway has another fuel center design that is sort of similar to this but does have a slightly larger walk in store with basically one actual aisle (one set of shelves in the middle of the floor space) of goods (as opposed to the Long Beach Vons and other designs I describe above where all merchandise for sale is against the walls); this is seen in Dixon, CA; Fair Oaks, CA; Rancho Cordova, CA; and again various others.

Safeway does have a full/legitimate c-store design they built from scratch with 3 full aisles, various drink dispensers, hot dog roller, etc., and that one is used in Reno and Sparks (also one Vons in Las Vegas) but that was because they wanted to have slot machines so those c-stores are "separate stores" from the main store (separate store number/own store director) so they can have additional slot machines out there without reducing the number of slot machines inside the main stores. The Bishop Vons also has a full c-store built by Safeway; the South Lake Tahoe, CA Safeway has a full c-store but Safeway acquired that site from a different gas station operator who built that full c-store. I have not seen any other pre-Albertsons Safeway units with a full c-store (a few opened in the past 3 years have opened with full c-stores under Albertsons).

[ClownLoach]

Until now when they've converted from Pavilions to Vons the first step is the rebrand, then they do a light remodel of the store usually just painting with the same decor in place. Lakewood, Anaheim Hills and Westminster went that way so they have had a pretty consistent pattern for these banner changes going back over a decade.

The fact is that the banner change didn't happen, and the store is surrounded by a older than normal clientele that has plenty of time to write letters to the CEO, harass the Store Manager, etc. and write paranoid reviews convinced that if the sign changes then they'll switch sourcing to rotten meat and spoiled milk as seen recently. So ultimately they save money by not changing the brand, the store is a "higher tier" store in the minds of its change-adverse customers even though it was downgraded to Vons decor and fixtures over a decade ago. Because the other nearby Vons stores are subpar the customer perception in the market is that Vons is a significant downgrade when in reality this has just been a much better operated Vons (with a different sign) to begin with. If they hadn't pissed off the neighborhood with the Albertsons down the street that got the most awful year long remodel of all time (which gave them triple split aisles with half the typical lighting of a "Premium fresh and healthy" decor) then sold to Haggen - I'd say they should rebrand this unit to Albertsons if they want to do something different.

There is no logical reason to rebrand in September when the store has sat for 6 months since remodeling. And now they've added Harris Ranch and See's Candies which I haven't seen in other Pavilions, it wouldn't make sense to add new amenities with the intention of removal in three or four months.

The Traffic Circle Ralphs and Vons are on opposite corners from each other. No way they'll be able to keep both as they're textbook overlaps. They spent a lot of money expanding the Ralphs not too long ago, but then Vons also expanded about 15 years ago when the fuel center was added. The Vons for some reason gets bombarded with college students buying beer by the cart load and seems to attract a lower end clientele vs the Ralphs. But the Ralphs doesn't have the greatest parking. The Ralphs is consistently busy and their 2nd highest volume in Long Beach, Marina Pacifica is their top store (I can't believe it's nearly been 30 years since it opened now, time flies). The Vons fuel center doesn't do very much business and is pretty small, 7 pumps. Not enough room for a real convenience store, it's really like the stations they used to build in the 80s with a little room with one Coke cooler and a rack of oil. Lots of customer fights over one way access to the pumps which starts on the less logical side of the station for fire ingress/egress; I used to fill up there before Costco added a station in Signal Hill and I observed a fistfight when a guy cut a line of a dozen cars by entering on the more logical entry side despite "do not enter" signage on the island. It's a pretty well hated gas station.

I agree it does not make sense why they would wait until September to rebrand. Do you know if they've done a grand reopening under the Pavilions banner?

Keeping both of the traffic circle stores (and closing no stores "as a result of the merger") and divesting this Pavilions instead is how you rule the grocery operation at the traffic circle. They could easily close one of the two traffic circle stores but retain that gas station. But in the event of a divest situation that traffic circle Vons is the store to go, there is no question. I am actually expecting them to argue none of those 3 stores need to be divested. Whether or not they can win said argument is another story. They may also be trying to play UFCW here to try and get UFCW in the (divest fewer stores to ensure more of our employees remain with the stable giant merged Kroger) mode too here. No telling what is happening behind closed doors.

That Vons fuel station is a standard Safeway gas station prototype. That was prototype 2 for Safeway fuel (prototype 1 was like a standard scratch built Kroger fuel station with a kiosk in the middle that the customer could not enter and paid through a bank like drawer) in an effort to sell more beverages out of the fuel stations by allowing customers inside the little building to select items. They don't all have the store/booth in the space where another pump should be like Long Beach (some do though), but that little store/booth that you can walk into with hardly any items against the two walls they have in there is identical to the store with walk in access that I've seen at many, many Safeway fuel centers. This includes Safeway fuel centers in places like Granite Bay, CA; Chico, CA; Roseville, CA (Douglas); Pleasanton, CA; some in WA/Canada as well. Safeway has another fuel center design that is sort of similar to this but does have a slightly larger walk in store with basically one actual aisle (one set of shelves in the middle of the floor space) of goods (as opposed to the Long Beach Vons and other designs I describe above where all merchandise for sale is against the walls); this is seen in Dixon, CA; Fair Oaks, CA; Rancho Cordova, CA; and again various others.

Safeway does have a full/legitimate c-store design they built from scratch with 3 full aisles, various drink dispensers, hot dog roller, etc., and that one is used in Reno and Sparks (also one Vons in Las Vegas) but that was because they wanted to have slot machines so those c-stores are "separate stores" from the main store (separate store number/own store director) so they can have additional slot machines out there without reducing the number of slot machines inside the main stores. The Bishop Vons also has a full c-store built by Safeway; the South Lake Tahoe, CA Safeway has a full c-store but Safeway acquired that site from a different gas station operator who built that full c-store. I have not seen any other pre-Albertsons Safeway units with a full c-store (a few opened in the past 3 years have opened with full c-stores under Albertsons).

El Dorado Park Estates area might as well be a different city and those folks are not going to go to the Traffic Circle. There is a ton of money there. Ideally they would try to keep all three but it'll never happen, and I would expect Stater Bros would jump on divestiture of that Traffic Circle Vons (Or the Ralphs, really both are their typical size store and ideal neighborhood. They basically put everyone except Pavilions out of business at Spring/Palo Verde where there was the Ralphs a block north, Lucky, Albertsons, Pavilions, and Food4Less/Spring Farms IGA/F&E. Stater came in and wiped out everyone but Pavilions.

[retailfanmitchell019]

I agree it does not make sense why they would wait until September to rebrand. Do you know if they've done a grand reopening under the Pavilions banner?

Keeping both of the traffic circle stores (and closing no stores "as a result of the merger") and divesting this Pavilions instead is how you rule the grocery operation at the traffic circle. They could easily close one of the two traffic circle stores but retain that gas station. But in the event of a divest situation that traffic circle Vons is the store to go, there is no question. I am actually expecting them to argue none of those 3 stores need to be divested. Whether or not they can win said argument is another story. They may also be trying to play UFCW here to try and get UFCW in the (divest fewer stores to ensure more of our employees remain with the stable giant merged Kroger) mode too here. No telling what is happening behind closed doors.

El Dorado Park Estates area might as well be a different city and those folks are not going to go to the Traffic Circle. There is a ton of money there. Ideally they would try to keep all three but it'll never happen, and I would expect Stater Bros would jump on divestiture of that Traffic Circle Vons (Or the Ralphs, really both are their typical size store and ideal neighborhood. They basically put everyone except Pavilions out of business at Spring/Palo Verde where there was the Ralphs a block north, Lucky, Albertsons, Pavilions, and Food4Less/Spring Farms IGA/F&E. Stater came in and wiped out everyone but Pavilions.

I'd expect either Save Mart (would hypothetically have rights to the Albertsons name) or Stater Bros. to buy the Traffic Circle Vons. Save Mart, assuming they get the Albertsons name, would convert this store to Albertsons (I still think Ahold will scoop up Save Mart and maybe Stater 6 months after they acquire Albertsons/Kroger divests). Ahold has been eyeing Stater Bros. on and off for years.
In Long Beach, I also think the small Vons in the Belmont Shore area will be divested. I also think both Vons in Lakewood are getting divested.
If Kroger argues that no stores in a competitive area have to be divested, the deal is game over.

I just wonder who'd buy the Vons gas station.

[ClownLoach]

I agree it does not make sense why they would wait until September to rebrand. Do you know if they've done a grand reopening under the Pavilions banner?

Keeping both of the traffic circle stores (and closing no stores "as a result of the merger") and divesting this Pavilions instead is how you rule the grocery operation at the traffic circle. They could easily close one of the two traffic circle stores but retain that gas station. But in the event of a divest situation that traffic circle Vons is the store to go, there is no question. I am actually expecting them to argue none of those 3 stores need to be divested. Whether or not they can win said argument is another story. They may also be trying to play UFCW here to try and get UFCW in the (divest fewer stores to ensure more of our employees remain with the stable giant merged Kroger) mode too here. No telling what is happening behind closed doors.

El Dorado Park Estates area might as well be a different city and those folks are not going to go to the Traffic Circle. There is a ton of money there. Ideally they would try to keep all three but it'll never happen, and I would expect Stater Bros would jump on divestiture of that Traffic Circle Vons (Or the Ralphs, really both are their typical size store and ideal neighborhood. They basically put everyone except Pavilions out of business at Spring/Palo Verde where there was the Ralphs a block north, Lucky, Albertsons, Pavilions, and Food4Less/Spring Farms IGA/F&E. Stater came in and wiped out everyone but Pavilions.

I'd expect either Save Mart (would hypothetically have rights to the Albertsons name) or Stater Bros. to buy the Traffic Circle Vons. Save Mart, assuming they get the Albertsons name, would convert this store to Albertsons (I still think Ahold will scoop up Save Mart and maybe Stater 6 months after they acquire Albertsons/Kroger divests). Ahold has been eyeing Stater Bros. on and off for years.
In Long Beach, I also think the small Vons in the Belmont Shore area will be divested. I also think both Vons in Lakewood are getting divested.
If Kroger argues that no stores in a competitive area have to be divested, the deal is game over.

I just wonder who'd buy the Vons gas station.

I know Long Beach pretty well and I have a very different take on what will happen there even in non competitive areas. Truthfully there is no overlap in Long Beach or Lakewood except for the traffic circle Vons. They don't need to divest anything else. But they can clear some problematic stores off the books.

Ralphs has nearly abandoned Lakewood and only has one small store left on Del Amo that has no room for expansion, it's probably only 30K Sq ft. and too small to grow transaction count. They'll want to divest that and keep the Albertsons and Vons in the area to convert. They'll also want to dump the oversize Ralphs Marketplace at Cherry and Carson on the Lakewood/Long Beach border due to shrink. It's only open because it's a redevelopment deal and pays no rent but that will eventually run out. The Bixby Knolls Vons is also a possible divest because of shrink and oversize format at least 80K in a center with history of armed robberies, it's a converted Home Depot if you can believe that and was a clone of the oversized Laguna Niguel location that was downsized after converting to Pavilions.

The small Belmont Shore Vons is an old Safeway and does very well for it's tiny size. It's a keeper. But the Broadway Vons downtown is a massively high shrink store, it's the only conventional left downtown but I still expect they will part ways with it as another token divest. If they hadn't spent a fortune tearing down the old Marina Safeway and rebuilding out to the curb with rooftop parking (probably giving them a new 30 year lease) I'm sure it would be gone now.

I'm going to remind everyone that thinks they'll be happy to merge while dumping 900+ stores. They'd be bankrupt in months with the promise of keeping all the non-store overhead of warehouses and facilities. They're not marketing any non-store facilities for sale, nor has anyone except this forum discussed divestiture of them. There isn't a snowballs chance in hell that they would be profitable with the cost of financing a colossal merger of that size and taking on all that non-retail overhead expense while only acquiring maybe 1000-1100 ACI locations. Yes the cost of acquisition goes down, but not that much because the stores sold or divested will be at a significantly lower price than if say Whole Foods offered to buy out a lease on a single nice, profitable high volume Albertsons. The pricing of this merger would be like that WFM scenario with KR paying top dollar for everything they do get, and bottom dollar being paid for what they don't...

Realistically take your typical urban area of about ten-twelve combined KR-ACI stores and pick two that go away as a sale, divest order, or implausible spinoff. They're not going to merge if more than two have to go based on the 650 store ceiling which I suspect is still too high to be profitable without another deal or mass facility closings despite promises being made now. If it isn't across the street or around the corner from another KR or ACI store they're not going to want to divest it unless it's a loser, and they won't get much for losers. I keep running the math on many proposed sales of divisions etc. and it just doesn't add up when I keep seeing suggestions of 4-5 divests per 10-12 stores. By then you just haven't bought anything significant if you're Kroger, your market share increase is inconsequential, you've spent a boatload of cash and borrowed a tanker load more. They're frankly much better off waiting for an ACI breakup to buy the pieces most desired in any scenario where 650 or more can't be bought, and frankly I suspect that the 650 count drops based on what actually needs to go if they are going to be asked to divest anything that's got decent volume and profit. Buying the rest of the company would be a no-go if they can't keep at least 70% of the ACI stores at an absolute minimum, with a desired preference in the 80% range while keeping at least 90% of current KR stores. Otherwise please tell me what they're getting for $25 billion (minus a few hundred million in divest or spin proceeds, again a completely inconsequential figure).

[ClownLoach]

I'm going to go further on my previous post. I believe the 650 store maximum is absolutely assuming that the stores being sold, spun, or turned into paper airplanes are lower volume units.

I'm going out on a limb and going to assume with all those small rural Safeway and Albertsons stores scattered around - I would bet there are only about 800-900 ACI stores that even deliver decent volume. The rest are low volume, low sales, and low value.

And where are the higher volume stores? Conveniently where the competition is.

If the 650 divest number was hit and all of those stores were in the upper half of sales volume - which we should assume would be the case in overlapping markets - then you're left with a very unproductive chain of low volume stores that we know are the type Kroger doesn't even like to operate. And we know that when a divestiture is involved then the buyers take full advantage of the sellers and pay a tiny fraction of what they're worth in the best possible scenario. We saw from the Haggen bankruptcy that they bought many stores for $1 each, dozens and dozens, and many for less than $100K each. Why in the world would we think Kroger would feel good about still paying $22-23B for ACI minus 650 stores when the 650 represent higher volume AND sold/spun valued at $2B maximum? $23B for about 1500 stores while the competitors get 650 for $2B or less?

It ain't gonna happen. Not even close. Pick your favorite big town, point to one or two stores and that's the absolute maximum they'll give up or otherwise no deal and they push for an ACI breakup behind the scenes.

So again these wild divestiture proposals of selling all of ACI Arizona, or anything that physically says Albertsons, or all of ACI SoCal which is a far higher store count than all of Ralphs/F4L SoCal, or all of Safeway in the PNW - there isn't any possibility of these coming to fruition.

[veteran+]

Awesome deep critical analysis!

[ClownLoach]

Awesome deep critical analysis!

Thanks, I just keep pulling my hair out when I read proposals that basically leave the new Kroger with about the same or even less stores than it had before making the acquisition. It makes no sense.

At least 70% of the ACI units need to be kept, AND that 70% of store units need to deliver at least 85% to 90% of ACI's total sales volume or there is no chance of a successful merger without mass facility closings, tens or even hundreds of thousands of layoffs, and double digit price increases across the board. All of which would deliver an exodus of sales to Walmart and others, immediately bankrupting the new Kroger. They're aggressive for sure, but they're not stupid.

[retailfanmitchell019]

I'm going to go further on my previous post. I believe the 650 store maximum is absolutely assuming that the stores being sold, spun, or turned into paper airplanes are lower volume units.

I'm going out on a limb and going to assume with all those small rural Safeway and Albertsons stores scattered around - I would bet there are only about 800-900 ACI stores that even deliver decent volume. The rest are low volume, low sales, and low value.

And where are the higher volume stores? Conveniently where the competition is.

If the 650 divest number was hit and all of those stores were in the upper half of sales volume - which we should assume would be the case in overlapping markets - then you're left with a very unproductive chain of low volume stores that we know are the type Kroger doesn't even like to operate. And we know that when a divestiture is involved then the buyers take full advantage of the sellers and pay a tiny fraction of what they're worth in the best possible scenario. We saw from the Haggen bankruptcy that they bought many stores for $1 each, dozens and dozens, and many for less than $100K each. Why in the world would we think Kroger would feel good about still paying $22-23B for ACI minus 650 stores when the 650 represent higher volume AND sold/spun valued at $2B maximum? $23B for about 1500 stores while the competitors get 650 for $2B or less?

It ain't gonna happen. Not even close. Pick your favorite big town, point to one or two stores and that's the absolute maximum they'll give up or otherwise no deal and they push for an ACI breakup behind the scenes.

So again these wild divestiture proposals of selling all of ACI Arizona, or anything that physically says Albertsons, or all of ACI SoCal which is a far higher store count than all of Ralphs/F4L SoCal, or all of Safeway in the PNW - there isn't any possibility of these coming to fruition.

Not trying to argue here, but I believe the FTC will make Kroger divest at least 350 KR/ACI stores, 7% of the combined company. 168 stores were divested during the Albertsons/Safeway merger, most of them being an Albertsons competing with a Safeway (or vice versa) in the same zip code. That was 7% of the combined Albertsons/Safeway company. Similar numbers for the Albertsons/ASC merger in 1999.
The FTC is going to view this merger as a merger between the two largest unionized chains.

I still think the deal is going to collapse. I don't think Albertsons will break up again, but if they do, I expect Ahold to buy the divisions overlapping with Kroger. That, or they sell the weak assets to focus on operating the core assets for the long haul (NorCal, SoCal, Southwest, Jewel, PNW).