Smith's California Adventure

California. No non-grocery posts.
surfingdude
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by surfingdude »

I believe that store was from Smith's first failed entry in to CA and was sold to Lucky.
Last edited by surfingdude on September 24th, 2021, 1:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by surfingdude »

veteran+ wrote: September 24th, 2021, 8:41 am There was at least ONE Smiths in Palms Springs on Highway 111.

I believe the building and center were torn down and the lot is still empty?
I believe that store was from Smith's first failed CA entry and was subsequently sold to Lucky.
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by klkla »

veteran+ wrote: September 24th, 2021, 8:41 am There was at least ONE Smiths in Palms Springs on Highway 111.

I believe the building and center were torn down and the lot is still empty?
You are correct but that wasn't the Smith's from the 1990's. They had previously operated in SoCal as Smith's Food King but gave up in 1984 and sold most of their stores to Lucky or just closed them altogether. The store you are referring to was from that era.
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by luckysaver »

Smiths exited SoCal in 1996 when Kroger bought out Fred Meyer. 1996 was when Ralphs took over both Hughes and Smiths as part of the transition from Fred Meyer to Kroger. Most SoCal locations transferred to Ralphs and they were quickly converted to either Ralphs, Food4Less/FoodsCo, sold or subleased. Smiths had 33 locations with others pending at the time. At least 12 existing Ralphs/Food4Less stores were ex-Smiths. Examples include Ralphs 108 La Jolla (Fresh Fare format) and Food4Less 369 La Puente (includes a carniceria). The dairy facility in Riverside CA near March AFB was originally Smiths' facility and transferred to Ralphs as part of the closure. Las Vegas stores also transferred to Ralphs and reopened as Food4Less. In the eastern part of Bakersfield, the FoodsCo on Haley St at the 178 Freeway was a Smiths (the FoodsCo gas station was added by Kroger as the former Smiths never had a gas station),

Albertsons picked up a number of Smiths buildings. F4L508 in Fullerton was briefly an Albertsons-Savon before it went back to Food4Less. The store in Covina on Azusa Ave has been vacant for years (since around 2015) and I'm hoping a Winco Foods moves in (Winco took over several Smiths buildings).

Also interesting is the El Super in the LA City neighborhood of Arleta (San Fernando Valley), which was originally a Smiths. The exterior is that of a Smiths but the interior is more of a typical El Super.

I used to shop at both the Covina and La Puente Smiths stores. Both stores had the "21 stores under one roof" layout until they were completely remodeled by Albertsons (Covina) and Food4Less (La Puente) respectively.
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by Bagels »

Smith’s exited SoCal in 1996, but it was because they lost a ton of money. They sold out to Fred Meyer in 1997; some narratives indicate that the SoCal experiment crippled their balance sheet, forcing that sale. Kroger acquired Free Meyer in late 1998, nearly three years after Smiths announced its exit.

It’s stores were acquired by Ralphs, Vons and Lucky:
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm ... ?_amp=true
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by storewanderer »

I think Smiths closed all SoCal Stores, I don't think any went to competitors as operating stores. Food 4 Less moved into some stores real quick while Smiths still held leases on the stores and those leases were marketed with the rest of the Smiths SoCal assets and some random land sites elsewhere.

Smiths problems in SoCal were well documented and the company went back and forth on if they were going to keep the stores or shut them down. Given right as they were exiting SoCal they bought Smitty's in AZ, it seemed like they had a way to do some deal. The SoCal assets were obviously a huge money sink for the company relative to purchasing the smaller/older Smitty's chain in AZ.

It probably was what led them to selling out to Fred Meyer. I do not think Smiths and Fred Meyer were a great fit. Smiths was a discount/downscale type of merchandiser while Fred Meyer was higher priced/middle upper end merchandising. Kroger and Smiths seem to have ended up as a good fit though.
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by retailfanmitchell019 »

luckysaver wrote: January 24th, 2022, 12:57 am I used to shop at both the Covina and La Puente Smiths stores. Both stores had the "21 stores under one roof" layout until they were completely remodeled by Albertsons (Covina) and Food4Less (La Puente) respectively.
Albertsons also bought a Smith's in Lakewood. It closed in 2009, now a WinCo. Both this and Covina got the late 90's Albertsons interior (Blue & Green Awnings)
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by klkla »

veteran+ wrote: September 24th, 2021, 8:41 am There was at least ONE Smiths in Palms Springs on Highway 111.

I believe the building and center were torn down and the lot is still empty?
Yes, but as mentioned above that was another venture for them when they bought the Food King chain in the 1970's (The stores were actually called Smith's Food King) and sold them to Lucky around 1984. The most successful of that group of stores still in operation is the Albertson's on Hillhurst Ave, in Los Feliz.
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by storewanderer »

I think they used the Food King name in Utah too.

This is an interesting thread post. It also theorizes something none of us have before: those CA Smiths needed to go, to allow for the mergers between Fred Meyer, Ralphs, and Smiths...

https://urbanarchaelogistics.blogspot.com/2016/

Also Palm Springs: https://urbanarchaelogistics.blogspot.com/2017/07/
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Re: Smith's California Adventure

Post by jamcool »

The Smith’s/Smitty’s/Fred Meyer/Hughes/Ralphs consolidation came through the acquisition by Yucaipa Cos., who sold it all off to Kroger. The AZ Smith’s were combined into Fry’s, the Smitty’s became Fred Meyer Marketplace -for about a year-before changing to Fry’s Marketplace
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