Crucial times for Shoppers

Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia. No non-grocery posts.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by BatteryMill »

mjhale wrote: October 2nd, 2022, 5:23 am Aldi and Lidl have the lock on deep discount. When people think warehouse they think Costco, BJs and Sam's. In Shoppers heyday none of those companies were in the DC/Baltimore area so the warehouse discount format worked. If one wants cheap food you have to go to Aldi, Lidl or Walmart and shop in that sort of environment. If you want a conventional store you are going to pay for it at Giant, Safeway or Harris Teeter. The store that doesn't exist is a discount conventional. Not everyone wants to endure Walmart or settle for limited selection to get lower pricing. Also with Shoppers currently in neighborhoods that would likely benefit from lower pricing it could be the strong format that they need to stay viable going forward.
Shoppers had deep discount competition from its inception, even to the 2000s. Warehouse clubs, especially from these three brands (and predecessors like PACE, Price Club) were an item during Shoppers' golden age as well. How would they fare in deep discount and warehouse grocery (again, like WinCo/Redner's)? I don't think it'll be impossible for Shoppers to pull such a thing off, but Walmart-level discount would work as a second option. After all there aren't any Neighborhood Markets in the immediate area.
storewanderer wrote: October 2nd, 2022, 12:42 am Publix is very unlikely to buy any unionized stores as operating stores. I don't think Food Lion is running in the type of locations Publix would be looking for.

That is a very sad loss for that store in Alexandria. Unfortunate decision to close, it must have been too perimeter heavy for Shoppers, Shoppers isn't exactly a known destination for fresh departments beyond donuts and fried chicken, and Target having a fair amount of food in the same center likely didn't help.
I was speaking of the likelihood of Shoppers buying into Ahold Delhaize sites. Publix has bought other Delhaize locations in the past, and they have been known in recent years to tear down and construct new where buildings not up to their specifications.
mjhale wrote: October 2nd, 2022, 5:43 am If something is going on with Albertsons and UNFI were a beneficiary they would need to operate something on the level of the Shoppers Market concept to even have a chance at retaining customers from Giant and Safeway stores they could potentially inherit. Running a former Giant or Safeway as a current format Shoppers is going to result in a closed store. That isn't good for anyone. Unless Publix swoops and gets their "in" with castoffs of castoffs with closed former Giant and Safeway stores that ended up with UNFI.
Does it imply that UNFI/Shoppers locations in those sites will be a stopgap between Ahold Delhaize-Albertsons and Publix? I'm not sure exactly.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by marketreportblog »

The Compare Foods situation is a very interesting one. Being that Compare Foods is a New York City-originating group, I can speak a little bit to this very odd situation. Here's a brief history of Compare Foods: in the late 1980s or so, the owner of an Associated Supermarket in Queens, NY sought to create a new format of Hispanic-targeted supermarkets so he created Compare Foods within the NYC cooperative Associated Food Holdings (Compare being a word in both English and Spanish). He eventually sold the brand name to Associated, which through some reorganizations and mergers and whatnot became a private equity-owned group called Associated Supermarket Group (ASG) based on Long Island. ASG is currently a cooperative of a few hundred independent supermarkets ranging in size from small bodegas to full supermarkets. The original founding family of Compare Foods (the Penas, whose company is called Aurora Grocery Group) wanted to leave that new group but the new owners wouldn't sell them the name back, so the core group of Compare Foods stores in the northeast were switched to Gala Foods and Gala Fresh Farms with Key Food Stores Co-Operative. At some point along the way, Aurora established a presence in the mid-Atlantic, mostly the Carolinas. Other operators joined Compare in the Carolinas and Virginia etc. Aurora's Carolinas stores are still called Compare and they're still with ASG.

ASG in the New York metropolitan area and New England is supplied by C&S and uses their own Avenue A storebrand, alongside the Best Yet and Full Circle brands. In the mid-Atlantic area, I'm not sure who supplies the Compare stores (never been to one) but they use Hy-Top from the Federated Group. While I don't know who owns/owned the Maryland stores, they were supplied by UNFI and sold Essential Everyday. Almost certainly, the stores were sold by UNFI to a Compare Foods operator with a clause in the sale that the stores would continue to be supplied by UNFI, for one reason or another.

I initially assumed that the Maryland stores, like the bulk of the Carolinas stores, were owned by Aurora Grocery. It does not appear that they were. I can't find a record of an owner of those stores. Execution at the Carolinas stores seems to vary immensely among locations and owners, with some appearing to be dirty old former chain stores, and others are quite nice. It seems these neighborhoods were not demographically in line with Compare Foods' typical spots, with larger Black populations and smaller Latino populations.

What I believe happened was this: the Compare Foods operators in MD merchandised the store wrong, priced most items too high, and struggled in the larger-than-usual locations. They may even have been backed into a restrictive distribution contract with UNFI. They lose money and go into debt. UNFI proposes a deal wherein the operators sell the stores back to them to pay off the owners' debt to UNFI so that the owners don't go bankrupt and UNFI gets the stores back. It's a combination of poor management and a bad situation. Plus, it was a new market for the Compare name to break into. That's just my speculation, but I think it's pretty likely.

A side note: ASG has been in trouble for several years, and shrinking in its core NYC market with what used to be some major market leaders (Associated, Met Foods, Pioneer). The private equity takeover was followed by an odd situation in which the cooperative was sold to its corporate management, and the former president and vice-president are now co-owners and co-CEOs of the cooperative. Down in Florida, NYC group Krasdale Foods has established a large presence in the Hispanic market with Bravo, but as of late, New Jersey-based Key Food has been pretty much steamrolling them at their own game with better-run, nicer stores and better prices. Key Food, by the way, is UNFI-supplied. Now, some Key Food executives have spoken rather boldly about closing the gap between Florida and New Jersey. To me, the obvious way to do that is with the Florida playbook: convert a bunch of Compare Foods in the mid-Atlantic to Key Food brands, impress people with lowering prices and big renovations, and take over the Hispanic market in the mid-Atlantic area, too. For an example, check out this Bravo - https://www.google.com/maps/uv?pb=!1s0x ... p6BQjCARAD , converted to Key Food - https://www.google.com/maps/uv?pb=!1s0x ... p6BQjCARAD , in Hollywood, FL. That's an easy way to get into the Carolinas, and beat another NYC competitor they know well, without exactly opening any new stores.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by storewanderer »

marketreportblog wrote: October 2nd, 2022, 8:47 pm The Compare Foods situation is a very interesting one. Being that Compare Foods is a New York City-originating group, I can speak a little bit to this very odd situation. Here's a brief history of Compare Foods: in the late 1980s or so, the owner of an Associated Supermarket in Queens, NY sought to create a new format of Hispanic-targeted supermarkets so he created Compare Foods within the NYC cooperative Associated Food Holdings (Compare being a word in both English and Spanish). He eventually sold the brand name to Associated, which through some reorganizations and mergers and whatnot became a private equity-owned group called Associated Supermarket Group (ASG) based on Long Island. ASG is currently a cooperative of a few hundred independent supermarkets ranging in size from small bodegas to full supermarkets. The original founding family of Compare Foods (the Penas, whose company is called Aurora Grocery Group) wanted to leave that new group but the new owners wouldn't sell them the name back, so the core group of Compare Foods stores in the northeast were switched to Gala Foods and Gala Fresh Farms with Key Food Stores Co-Operative. At some point along the way, Aurora established a presence in the mid-Atlantic, mostly the Carolinas. Other operators joined Compare in the Carolinas and Virginia etc. Aurora's Carolinas stores are still called Compare and they're still with ASG.

ASG in the New York metropolitan area and New England is supplied by C&S and uses their own Avenue A storebrand, alongside the Best Yet and Full Circle brands. In the mid-Atlantic area, I'm not sure who supplies the Compare stores (never been to one) but they use Hy-Top from the Federated Group. While I don't know who owns/owned the Maryland stores, they were supplied by UNFI and sold Essential Everyday. Almost certainly, the stores were sold by UNFI to a Compare Foods operator with a clause in the sale that the stores would continue to be supplied by UNFI, for one reason or another.

I initially assumed that the Maryland stores, like the bulk of the Carolinas stores, were owned by Aurora Grocery. It does not appear that they were. I can't find a record of an owner of those stores. Execution at the Carolinas stores seems to vary immensely among locations and owners, with some appearing to be dirty old former chain stores, and others are quite nice. It seems these neighborhoods were not demographically in line with Compare Foods' typical spots, with larger Black populations and smaller Latino populations.

What I believe happened was this: the Compare Foods operators in MD merchandised the store wrong, priced most items too high, and struggled in the larger-than-usual locations. They may even have been backed into a restrictive distribution contract with UNFI. They lose money and go into debt. UNFI proposes a deal wherein the operators sell the stores back to them to pay off the owners' debt to UNFI so that the owners don't go bankrupt and UNFI gets the stores back. It's a combination of poor management and a bad situation. Plus, it was a new market for the Compare name to break into. That's just my speculation, but I think it's pretty likely.

A side note: ASG has been in trouble for several years, and shrinking in its core NYC market with what used to be some major market leaders (Associated, Met Foods, Pioneer). The private equity takeover was followed by an odd situation in which the cooperative was sold to its corporate management, and the former president and vice-president are now co-owners and co-CEOs of the cooperative. Down in Florida, NYC group Krasdale Foods has established a large presence in the Hispanic market with Bravo, but as of late, New Jersey-based Key Food has been pretty much steamrolling them at their own game with better-run, nicer stores and better prices. Key Food, by the way, is UNFI-supplied. Now, some Key Food executives have spoken rather boldly about closing the gap between Florida and New Jersey. To me, the obvious way to do that is with the Florida playbook: convert a bunch of Compare Foods in the mid-Atlantic to Key Food brands, impress people with lowering prices and big renovations, and take over the Hispanic market in the mid-Atlantic area, too. For an example, check out this Bravo - https://www.google.com/maps/uv?pb=!1s0x ... p6BQjCARAD , converted to Key Food - https://www.google.com/maps/uv?pb=!1s0x ... p6BQjCARAD , in Hollywood, FL. That's an easy way to get into the Carolinas, and beat another NYC competitor they know well, without exactly opening any new stores.
The one MD Store in Bladensburg or whatever it is, is a former Shoppers and supplied by ASG using that Avenue A brand and Best Yet.

Also at 3020 N Goldenrod Rd, Winter Park, FL there is a store that was a Bravo in 2015-2017, then after that branded Compare Foods and using Shur Fine then Food Club for private label. Now it uses Essential Everyday for private label. It appears to be a Key Food now.. (on their website?)..

Roughly speaking on the MD Stores I am getting the impression reading reviews that the 3 stores being sold back to Shoppers, were, by Compare, shifted to a very poorly done Hispanic format with zero regard for the African American customer's desired merchandise mix (among other issues I read about in the reviews with how these stores treated customers). Given UNFI was supplying these as Shoppers and then supplying them as Compare it seems like keeping the same mix wouldn't have been too difficult but it was too difficult for whoever owned these 3 stores.

I also see a 5th Shoppers sold to Compare, at 6500 Eastern Ave. in Baltimore. I am not sure what is going on with it but it appears to currently be operating as "SAVEMART" (oh boy) using Shoppers interior and equipment. I can see evidence this store opened as Compare in 2020, then in early 2021 it was closed by Baltimore Health Department for "Operating Without a License" (how the heck...?)... the Baltimore Health Department also closed the Compare at 5600 The Alameda in 04/2021 for "no hot water THROUGHOUT the facility"- (okay, yes, things happen like that, must have been a bad luck that the hot water went out the same day the health inspector showed up). https://health.baltimorecity.gov/sites/ ... osures.pdf Back to 6500 Eastern, I can see in July 2022 it still appears to be operating as Compare Foods possibly. For some reason I cannot come up with a Google Maps on the 6500 Eastern location... I can find a single review Yelp, with a lot of photos, showing what is obviously a struggling poorly stocked store that needs a good floor shine/wax and has few to no customers https://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/compare-foods-baltimore
and this appears to be supplied by UNFI.



I'm trying to figure out who owned these MD Compares and it appears to be that ASG group but it is unclear. There is an article here https://www.bizjournals.com/baltimore/n ... imore.html with a quote from Pena the founder about the acquisition.

They have a Facebook page and a gmail address to contact...? Also looking at their posts they were doing some offers earlier this year with free items with purchases; one was a free milk; there is a photo of a Food Club Milk; the other was a free eggs; there is a photo of Great Value Eggs.
https://m.facebook.com/CompareFoodsMD
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by marketreportblog »

Interesting. Compare Foods calls that one Colmar Manor. I suppose ASG does already have a Super A Market in Falls Church, VA that does use Avenue A, so there is already C&S distribution infrastructure to get product down there. As for the Winter Park store, which is indeed now a Key Food, I really doubt that it was ever part of this Compare Foods group because it's branded only "Compare Supermarket" and has no representation of the Compare Foods logo, slogan, etc. However, your point stands because there was actually a Compare Foods in Tampa at 7611 Causeway Blvd! That, too, was called "Compare Supermarket" but used the Compare Foods logo. It's now an Ideal Food Basket, another Long Island-based cooperative. It seems it was also a former Bravo.

I suspect that product mix is a problem with ordering (store ownership) rather than supplying (UNFI). I assume that UNFI isn't going to deny the store owners the products they order if they don't own the stores anymore... but we also don't know what the sale was like; perhaps UNFI specifically excluded merchandising plans from the sale.

Yeah -- the Compare Foods stores must have been pretty terribly run to be shut down by the health department. At least in my area, it's pretty darn difficult to get shut down for health code violations. That's a way to tell it's pretty serious. Savemart has one other store in Halethorpe, which seems to have been there for at least 5 years and gets pretty solid reviews on Google Maps, as does the new one on Eastern in Baltimore. Both stores, however, seem to be on the older side.

ASG doesn't own any stores; it's just the cooperative that supports the independent store owners. And if Eligio Pena was quoted in that article (he and his family runs Aurora, which I mentioned), then I assume Aurora owned/owns the Maryland stores. That said, there's nothing about the Maryland stores that is similar to the other Aurora stores (like ads, social media, price signage in-store, etc -- not to mention I don't believe they were ever on the Aurora website), except perhaps for the fact that the decor is left over from the previous tenant. I wouldn't go by the brands shown in those ads -- I would assume they're just whatever stock photos they could get their hands on. Another reason I suspect those stores may not have been Aurora is that I live a little under a mile from an Aurora-owned Gala Foods in Worcester, Mass, and while the focus may be on Dominican and Puerto Rican foods, there's also an equally large selection of Haitian, Jamaican, and African foods and the store clearly serves both the Hispanic and Black communities in the city. So it's hard to say for sure.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by storewanderer »

marketreportblog wrote: October 3rd, 2022, 6:26 am Interesting. Compare Foods calls that one Colmar Manor. I suppose ASG does already have a Super A Market in Falls Church, VA that does use Avenue A, so there is already C&S distribution infrastructure to get product down there. As for the Winter Park store, which is indeed now a Key Food, I really doubt that it was ever part of this Compare Foods group because it's branded only "Compare Supermarket" and has no representation of the Compare Foods logo, slogan, etc. However, your point stands because there was actually a Compare Foods in Tampa at 7611 Causeway Blvd! That, too, was called "Compare Supermarket" but used the Compare Foods logo. It's now an Ideal Food Basket, another Long Island-based cooperative. It seems it was also a former Bravo.

I suspect that product mix is a problem with ordering (store ownership) rather than supplying (UNFI). I assume that UNFI isn't going to deny the store owners the products they order if they don't own the stores anymore... but we also don't know what the sale was like; perhaps UNFI specifically excluded merchandising plans from the sale.

Yeah -- the Compare Foods stores must have been pretty terribly run to be shut down by the health department. At least in my area, it's pretty darn difficult to get shut down for health code violations. That's a way to tell it's pretty serious. Savemart has one other store in Halethorpe, which seems to have been there for at least 5 years and gets pretty solid reviews on Google Maps, as does the new one on Eastern in Baltimore. Both stores, however, seem to be on the older side.

ASG doesn't own any stores; it's just the cooperative that supports the independent store owners. And if Eligio Pena was quoted in that article (he and his family runs Aurora, which I mentioned), then I assume Aurora owned/owns the Maryland stores. That said, there's nothing about the Maryland stores that is similar to the other Aurora stores (like ads, social media, price signage in-store, etc -- not to mention I don't believe they were ever on the Aurora website), except perhaps for the fact that the decor is left over from the previous tenant. I wouldn't go by the brands shown in those ads -- I would assume they're just whatever stock photos they could get their hands on. Another reason I suspect those stores may not have been Aurora is that I live a little under a mile from an Aurora-owned Gala Foods in Worcester, Mass, and while the focus may be on Dominican and Puerto Rican foods, there's also an equally large selection of Haitian, Jamaican, and African foods and the store clearly serves both the Hispanic and Black communities in the city. So it's hard to say for sure.
Super A looks like a very sad former Acme but it does appear very well stocked and orderly and with some deals. Looks like it was some other independent before Super A. That store appears to be using the same sale/shelf signage and private label they routed to the Bladensburg Compare that still has Shoppers decor.

The "Savemart" in Halethorpe looks to be a very very small store. It will be interesting to see how they do with the Shoppers.

Still such an odd turn of events to see stores coming back to Shoppers for any reason (and not closing outright or going to different random operators). I assume Shoppers will be reopening these as Union stores...
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by buckguy »

Bladensberg-Colmar Manor and the greater area around them is about 30-40% Hispanic and this has been growing since the 90s, so a Hispanic format is not novel there and there are other stores in that general area with a Hispanic format. The general area also is quite diverse---Mount Ranier and Hyattsville (nearby towns) have been growing more "hipster-ish" and have either held onto or increased their white populations. There's even a Whole Foods not far away in University Park, as well as one of the first Lidls. The DC Costco is not far away, so people in this area have varied options.

Whatever its deficiencies as an operator, this area would be a better fit than the chain in Baltimore which are more like the southern PG County areas where Shoppers has been remodeling a couple stores.

The Halethorpe store has an old 50s Food Fair pylon which is more visible when driving by on the nearby B-W Parkway than in the online pics and I think there are pics of that location as a Food Fair on the web. It looked more like an old Food fair 5-10 years ago. Given that Acme left DC about 40 years ago and the demographics around Falls Church have been pretty fluid since then, I would imagine that the Super A has had one or more previous lives.

The supermarket business has always had webs of interlocking and sometimes feuding families and this sounds like a new chapter with Hispanic families rather than the Italian. Jewish and Irish families of old. Giant-Landover had recurring drama because the family that wasn't in management retained a large block of stock. The Stop & Shop families also had a split and veteran+ can tell you about all the drama at Food Fair. The chains and co-ops in Cleveland had very complicated relationships and its only in the last generation that families form the 40s and 50s have largely passed out of ownership. I wouldn't be surprised if Compare and Aurora represented some kind of overlapping set of family members and their different approaches to the business.

Northern retail operators going into Florida is nothing new: Food Fair, Grand Union, Gray Drug, Cunningham Drug, etc. It often didn't work out in the long run but that never stopped anybody from trying. There is a small town chain in Ohio (Community Markets) that has a bought a large number of Sav-A-Lots recently and then you have these co-ops from the NYC area entering the market.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by mjhale »

Prior to Super A the old Falls Church Acme was a Magruders location. Magruders was a local chain that I think topped out at about 10 or so stores in their heyday. Their claim to fame was supposedly higher quality produce than Giant and Safeway. Growing up I had several neighbors whose parents would drive past multiple Giant and Safeway locations to get produce at Magruders. I visited the Falls Church location both as Magruders and Super A. Tired is a good descriptor for the store. It is serviceable but very cramped. It really needs to be cleared out and renovated, perhaps expanded too. There is a big Hispanic and Vietnamese population in the area that the store serves. The other international store in the area is Bestway at the other end of Graham Road. Bestway is a former Safeway location.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by BatteryMill »

According to Shoppers' recent Facebook posts, they are now hiring for the 7051 MLK location in Landover which is to reopen in November. It, however is drawing ire for reopening when they aren't considering employees who worked before closing. This is something that has happened with the numerous Toys R Us revival attempts, and it does make me wonder whether this was done ethically or not.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by pseudo3d »

BatteryMill wrote: October 5th, 2022, 11:46 am According to Shoppers' recent Facebook posts, they are now hiring for the 7051 MLK location in Landover which is to reopen in November. It, however is drawing ire for reopening when they aren't considering employees who worked before closing. This is something that has happened with the numerous Toys R Us revival attempts, and it does make me wonder whether this was done ethically or not.
The TRU revivals weren't very long, the mall stores only got to what, two?

The union issue complicates re-hiring employees and bumping rights and all that.
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Re: Crucial times for Shoppers

Post by BatteryMill »

pseudo3d wrote: January 9th, 2023, 10:25 am The TRU revivals weren't very long, the mall stores only got to what, two?

The union issue complicates re-hiring employees and bumping rights and all that.
Well there is one now, but I think it's far-removed from the 2018 closings enough.

Also, does the union issue have to do with TRU or Shoppers?
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