Save Mart closures

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storewanderer
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Save Mart closures

Post by storewanderer »

Looks like Save Mart is doing some quiet and quick closures:


Food Maxx- Bakersfield, CA Union Ave. - closure announced early this week and store's last day was today
Lots of other locations around Bakersfield.

Save Mart- Selma, CA - closure announced early December and store closed mid December
This removes them from Selma, but they are nearby 5-10 minutes in Kingsburg.

It looks like they just transfer employees to stores staying open so that is why these closures have such short notice.

Considering all things it is quite an accomplishment they are able to keep as many stores open as they do. It appears their remodel program and price cut program is helping them. I continue to find them to be the worst grocer in the region for price and quality.
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Re: Save Mart closures

Post by SamSpade »

They *just* resumed advertising for Food Maxx on Bakersfield radio so that's interesting.
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Re: Save Mart closures

Post by storewanderer »

Food Maxx has been a heavy radio advertiser ever since they converted two stores in NV to Food Maxx. Now that I think about it, I haven't heard one of their ads since around the holidays.

On an old country station that runs in Carson City, it seemed sometimes they were the only advertiser, and you'd hear their ads every break. Food Maxx has performed poorly in NV but the stores hang on. The locations both compete with Smiths. When they first converted, their prices were uniformly higher than Smiths. Lately their prices are ranging pretty competitive with Smiths if not a little lower (Smiths seems to be becoming less competitive).

Bakersfield has quite a bit of competition with FoodsCo, WinCo, and Superior.

Save Mart has fared rather poorly in Bakersfield. They had a newer store there from the 90's, but somehow Vons ended up with it. They took over Ralphs Stores there (3 stores), couldn't reopen Stockdale due to a non-compete with Vons, and closed the Oildale one which was a former Lucky within months of reopening. The third one was practically a brand new store when Save Mart took it over and it is still open (not sure how, but it is amazing what low volume stores Save Mart can make work). They also closed their original store there at the time they took over the Ralphs locations which I understand was small and older. I think they got the Food Maxx Stores through taking over F4L stores from Fleming and also one is possibly a former Pak N Save. The problem in Bakersfield is unlike Fresno where competition has sort of left the place, in Bakersfield, Vons/Albertsons both continued to play in the market as competitors. I suspect Save Mart stayed in Bakersfield in case the same thing happened there that happened in Fresno (all the major conventional competitors left or practically left). When Ralphs left, around the same time Albertsons was not doing well before selling off to Supervalu, it appeared there could be more openings. But that didn't quite play out. The other odd thing in Bakersfield is Cardenas, Northgate, and El Super have not gone there for some reason. And Superior just has that one store.
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Re: Save Mart closures

Post by retailfanmitchell019 »

Not to mention they still have that store in Tehachapi, which I'm sure is their southernmost store. Only competition is a new Dollar General Market and a mid-90's build Albertsons.
Stater Bros would be a great fit for Tehachapi.
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Re: Save Mart closures

Post by storewanderer »

They remodeled Tehachapi about 2 years ago; it was one of the initial stores in their remodel program after they started it back up again. I'm not sure how much they spent, but with the condition the store was previously in (1985 at best), I am sure things greatly improved with them remodeling it.

Stater and Save Mart should have engaged in a merger when Save Mart bought Albertsons NorCal. Stater should have been fully in charge of NorCal given their proven tract record in running former Albertsons stores in a successful manner. That would have been a much more successful path.
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