pseudo3d wrote:Despite Tyler having more chains than today, I wouldn't count that against Tyler but rather consolidations in the grocery industry. The situation in Bryan-College Station included at one time in 1991-1992 Albertsons, Winn-Dixie, Kroger, H-E-B Pantry, Randalls, AppleTree (former Safeway) and Jewel-Osco (former Skaggs Alpha Beta). Ultimately, of course, Albertsons bought the lone Jewel-Osco and then closed it to buy the Randalls, with the chain reaching three local stores at peak before disappearing under LLC, Winn-Dixie bowed out for good in 2002, AppleTree slowly lost its stores until the last ones sold out (and now even those are gone), and Kroger and H-E-B continued to expand.
I would blame it on Tyler. Here's why:
Kroger: Left before 1980. Still operates in Longview, Marshall, Henderson and Shreveport, which are beyond Tyler, in distribution terms.
Albertsons: first store on NNW Loop sold in 2003, second closed in 2008 or 2009. Still operates in Longview and Shreveport, in a similar distribution scenario as Kroger.
Winn Dixie: Never operated in Tyler, except maybe as Buddies, which predated WD's ownership. Longview, Kilgore, Gladewater, Henderson, and Marshall were further from distribution, and all had a store until 2003.
Jewel-Osco/Skaggs: While the Longview store was sold to Albertsons (and still survives), the Tyler store was not, because ABS said it was too close to the other Albertsons. It instead was the only store in the division
not sold to Albertsons. It became a Brookshire Supercenter (a one-off large store concept that didn't work) and closed by 1995-1996.
Safeway: When the division was sold off in 1987, both Longview stores, Marshal and Henderson were sold within 2 months of closing. One Tyler store on Vine St. was sold, but didn't last. The other, on S. Broadway, was never a grocery again. It has been split into two stores since 2 years after Safeway closed.
No other large chain wants to operate in the hometown of a regional grocer's distribution hub or headquarters. There are similar statistics for Monroe, LA; only a handful of independent stores operate there other than Brookshire, because they have their secondary DC there. (Kroger and Albertsons were both there at one time) Lufkin, TX, is similar; there's one HEB to 4 Brookshire Bros. stores. Brookshire Bros. is headquartered in Lufkin. (The HEB is in the former Albertsons.)