Retail Watchers

(The last time I bought a hoagie at Giant, which used to be made in the deli, I noticed the packaging was different....turns out they were now shipped in from California of all places!) Was it actually shipped from there, or maybe just the company's main address? Like we've seen the Safeway and oth...

If Kroger decided to change King Soopers, Fry's, QVC, and Ralphs over to the Kroger name, then that's not going to be a huge upset since those brands have more or less operating as Kroger stores anyway for a number of years now. Mariano's is a higher-end operation than Jewel and wouldn't generally f...

They were planning to convert Jewel to Albertsons. That would have taken place by 2001. Acme was to be converted in 2000 also. The plan was to have Albertsons as a single national grocery banner. I assure you the source I received that information from was very close to the situation. Of course aft...

For what it's worth, I know that pre-Safeway Randalls stores and H-E-B stores that have all the perishables and produce clustered to one side of the store was a direct clone of the Wegmans layout. Their prototypes for this layout for both stores both had their spokespersons mention Wegmans.

...the Southwest Parkway store likely closed due to the landlord playing hardball. No, the article on Kroger's closing mentioned that in the last past decade they've had profitability problems (I'm not sure if it's from a lack of volume or it was getting shoplifted). The landlord wanted Kroger to s...

I read in another article Weis has no debt. That is wonderful and explains a lot about how they have been able to keep going despite what appear to be somewhat low store volumes and in general not overly exciting stores in some really competitive places. I wonder how much of their real estate they ...

they mention the produce department will be at the center of the store, which is unusual, I suppose. Coming from my personal knowledge this is actually a pretty poor idea for them. Having produce on one side of the store and the deli/bakery/etc on the other is really good for getting the perimeter ...

...in November (man, they sure took their time with this one, didn't they?) Otherwise, the Marina store (turned Haggen, then closed) seems pretty interesting, the news article mentions that in addition to the trendy departments ("The store will feature a homeopathic section, Oregon wine cases, ...

They actually kind of turned it into a store/museum, as the store had signs with a couple different logos they had used over the years, and the windows had stickers of a 3rd logo that was never used on signs but they created them for this store. Last I knew, the Albertsons at 1650 W State serves th...

Do you know if they own the real estate on the other two stores? Slowly these holding pattern stores get capital but it seems to come in small ongoing doses. Tonight I found the Carson City, NV Smiths (an owned freestanding store) just got its parking lot reasphalted. First time in a long while. I ...