Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

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Re: Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

Post by storewanderer »

As far as Kroger operations go, QFC is upscale. Perhaps it is more a product of their locations in higher income areas than anything else.

If you spend more time outside OR/WA in some of the other Kroger operations, especially those in smaller and medium sized markets, notably stores under banners Smiths, Dillons, or Kroger, you will see what I mean.
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Re: Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

Post by SamSpade »

pseudo3d wrote: January 16th, 2018, 8:25 am Interesting, I definitely have a few remarks after seeing that:

1. Albertsons and Safeway should be the same, they have identical prices on almost everything, but then there's just a few items at Albertsons (I would've thought Safeway) that really push it to be more expensive.
. . .
4. No Costco?
5. I'm going to assume that the local independent is New Seasons Market, which is more upscale than typical and thus would have far and away the highest prices.
Sorry this took me a while to circle back on -
1. I was surprised too. I receive both stores advertisements despite a real geographic barrier in place to travel to Albertsons. I noticed there were a few price differences in the ads, which is why I bothered to include both.
4. I don't have a Costco membership of my own (drat) and they would not have carried many of these applicable sizes, with possibly the exception of a gallon of orange juice. They do have great prices on breads, but even that is like milk, where you must buy at least 2.
5. The local independent was actually Market of Choice but I was briefly in New Seasons this weekend and their price points are similar or on par with Albertsons or MoC. MoC positions itself in a somewhat unusual way. They seem to acknowledge that customers shop their store for higher-end items but sometimes want a traditional brand/offer and expect a fair price. This is a little bit like what New Seasons struck out to do (1/3 conventional, 2/3 specialty-natural-organic). Their produce department offers both conventional and organic, while New Seasons is now almost entirely organic. Their meat department offers some 'bulk' sizing and appropriate discounts.
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Re: Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

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Resurrecting an old thread to add some thoughts from late 2020—
I had to order groceries online as I was trying to be responsible about limiting contact with others, I've come from a COVID-19 "hot spot" (where isn't at this point :oops: , but definitely hotter than Oregon) so I decided to compare a few other brands now that online grocery shopping is becoming more common.
1) I went with Walmart, as I've generally had positive experiences and recently had an expensive car repair so I was hoping to save a little up front.
It was just over $70 for a pretty diverse basket that included deli but not raw meats, dairy products, produce, pantry staples used in breakfast or dinner, (pasture) eggs
2) Checked Target.com - Most of the items I ordered were available except some fresh produce, one of which actually ended up being canceled by Walmart as well. About $8 more. Items were around the same price, with a slight increase on most.
3) Safeway.com/Albertsons.com - in the past, this site has been extremely expensive so I expected such this time. It actually *wasn't* and came in about $9 over Walmart. With this week's $10 off $50+ purchase offer in the market, they came out approximately even. This site had a lot more choice in product, including their house brands.
4) Fred Meyer Pickup -$15 more. Again, surprising how Fred Meyer used to be much closer to Winco and Walmart pricing but now seems to align much closer to Albertsons and Safeway. Like the Safeway.com experience, there was definitely more depth in categories and most house label products were either Simple Truth or Private Selection, not Kroger label. Many "core" items were nearer to Walmart pricing, but outliers like the Arborio rice, the deli meat, and some of the dairy products were higher and that increased the overall basket price.
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Re: Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

Post by storewanderer »

SamSpade wrote: November 9th, 2020, 10:27 am Resurrecting an old thread to add some thoughts from late 2020—
I had to order groceries online as I was trying to be responsible about limiting contact with others, I've come from a COVID-19 "hot spot" (where isn't at this point :oops: , but definitely hotter than Oregon) so I decided to compare a few other brands now that online grocery shopping is becoming more common.
1) I went with Walmart, as I've generally had positive experiences and recently had an expensive car repair so I was hoping to save a little up front.
It was just over $70 for a pretty diverse basket that included deli but not raw meats, dairy products, produce, pantry staples used in breakfast or dinner, (pasture) eggs

3) Safeway.com/Albertsons.com - in the past, this site has been extremely expensive so I expected such this time. It actually *wasn't* and came in about $9 over Walmart. With this week's $10 off $50+ purchase offer in the market, they came out approximately even. This site had a lot more choice in product, including their house brands.
I have noticed some if not all of the Albertsons regions have discontinued the practice of charging more for online orders than in-store purchases if you do the Drive Up and Go. I'm not sure if you do home delivery if they still charge higher prices than in-store (plus delivery fee) like they used to. This is a big departure from how Safeway handled its online business and I am sure they were forced by competition to make this change.

If you want to have a fun experiment punch that order into a NorCal Safeway (try Sacramento area, it is on their standard/middle scale of pricing for NorCal) and see what your total is...

If you want to have another fun experiment punch that order into Raleys website and then do a few locations to see their zone pricing:
low price zone: Lake Tahoe Blvd.-South Lake Tahoe, CA
middle price zone: Emerald Bay Road- South Lake Tahoe, CA
high price zone: Redwood City, CA


Wal Mart really has it together for online ordering. I haven't used them for a drive up and go yet but for the website/ship to home, their execution is simply excellent all around. They are fast, efficient, and do a good job. Far better than Amazon or Target on speed, getting everything into one box, and quality of packaging of the order. Exactly what we've heard for the past 20 years about how great their logistics system is, that has really come to be true and very visible to end unit consumers during this pandemic. I am very impressed with them. I have done some orders from their website recently and in both cases all of the items arrived within a couple days, all in one box (one of those boxes was one of the biggest boxes I've ever seen), and just overall a really good experience.
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Re: Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

Post by SamSpade »

I'll have to try what you suggested sometime soon.

I did go to QFC.com as apparently their stores also now offer pickup -
QFC came in at $95.75 for the same basket (I had to guess on the frozen rice entree based on alternatives, it wasn't offered at QFC)
So, Fred Meyer will still feel cheaper than QFC, but a heck of a lot closer to other mainstream grocers.

QFC on a couple items I had to pick up last night that I didn't want to buy at Walmart due to price/size:
Seattle's Best Coffee KCups 10 count $5.99 sale price at Albertsons, $4.99 sale price at QFC (regular $8.49/$7.99)
Parsley (ended up with organic as no conventional available) $1.49 / $1.69
Navel oranges $1.99 / lb at both (went on sale *today* at ABS/SWY for $0.79/lb)
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Re: Portland, Ore. area grocery price comparison

Post by storewanderer »

SamSpade wrote: November 11th, 2020, 11:49 am I'll have to try what you suggested sometime soon.

I did go to QFC.com as apparently their stores also now offer pickup -
QFC came in at $95.75 for the same basket (I had to guess on the frozen rice entree based on alternatives, it wasn't offered at QFC)
So, Fred Meyer will still feel cheaper than QFC, but a heck of a lot closer to other mainstream grocers.

QFC on a couple items I had to pick up last night that I didn't want to buy at Walmart due to price/size:
Seattle's Best Coffee KCups 10 count $5.99 sale price at Albertsons, $4.99 sale price at QFC (regular $8.49/$7.99)
Parsley (ended up with organic as no conventional available) $1.49 / $1.69
Navel oranges $1.99 / lb at both (went on sale *today* at ABS/SWY for $0.79/lb)
I'm surprised QFC is even more than Fred Meyer. I would have expected them to be closer based on the increases Fred Meyer has made. QFC probably should not be priced that much above Albertsons/Safeway (I'm not really sure their product offering is better... it was better 10 years ago... but I'm not sure about today). At least they have some good sales.
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