Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by pseudo3d »

Alpha8472 wrote: January 16th, 2023, 4:52 pm Perhaps Kroger is telling Safeway and Albertsons to get rid of the poorly performing stores in advance of a merger.
First off, I think that's illegal.
Second off, the Randalls chain is living proof that your theory is wrong.
Third off, we've established that the Foods 4 Less is not Kroger owned but an old franchisee that's somehow stuck around.
Fourth off, all signs point to a lease issue rather than underperformance...
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by storewanderer »

Alpha8472 wrote: January 16th, 2023, 4:52 pm Perhaps Kroger is telling Safeway and Albertsons to get rid of the poorly performing stores in advance of a merger.
There seem to be things going on in Safeway that look like Kroger is already telling them what to do. I don't think Kroger is telling them what to do but it may be people within operations are looking at things Kroger does and trying to do things more the Kroger way in advance.

They keep cutting SKUs in center store. Another round of clearance is happening again and more oddball items are going away. The last time they did this, over the summer, a lot more items disappeared than were added in as new items.

Safeway NorCal is back to a Steve Burd-style expense cut and shrink cut just in time sort of system on produce where they send very minimal amounts of produce to the stores and want to let displays go empty before restocking the displays. This is also something Kroger does. In Safeway's case this is a positive because they put out way too much produce and weren't rotating it properly in Reno.

They are also in the process of redesigning the O Organics label and talking up how it is the oldest Organic brand or something. That brand is dead in action as Simple Truth has steamrolled it, not sure why they are wasting any further efforts on it.
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by retailfanmitchell019 »

storewanderer wrote: January 18th, 2023, 11:47 pm They are also in the process of redesigning the O Organics label and talking up how it is the oldest Organic brand or something. That brand is dead in action as Simple Truth has steamrolled it, not sure why they are wasting any further efforts on it.
I bet O Organics will go into Albertsons Too/Save Mart/SpinCo/whatever the divest holding company will be called.
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by HCal »

storewanderer wrote: January 18th, 2023, 11:47 pm They are also in the process of redesigning the O Organics label and talking up how it is the oldest Organic brand or something. That brand is dead in action as Simple Truth has steamrolled it, not sure why they are wasting any further efforts on it.
Simple Truth isn't a true organic brand. Many of their products are "natural" (which is a totally meaningless term) rather than organic. This causes confusion and annoys customers who feel tricked into paying more for a non-organic product.

At least in Orange County amongst Pavilions shoppers, the O Organics label has a lot of value, and people seem to think it is a major national brand like Horizon. I believe the same is true in the bay area. If the merger goes through, my suggestion would be to use O Organics for the actual organic products, and Simple Truth for the stuff that is being marketed as "natural" or "healthy" for whatever reason but doesn't have the USDA organic certification. O Organics will really take off if Kroger brings down the prices a bit.
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by storewanderer »

HCal wrote: January 19th, 2023, 4:45 pm

Simple Truth isn't a true organic brand. Many of their products are "natural" (which is a totally meaningless term) rather than organic. This causes confusion and annoys customers who feel tricked into paying more for a non-organic product.

At least in Orange County amongst Pavilions shoppers, the O Organics label has a lot of value, and people seem to think it is a major national brand like Horizon. I believe the same is true in the bay area. If the merger goes through, my suggestion would be to use O Organics for the actual organic products, and Simple Truth for the stuff that is being marketed as "natural" or "healthy" for whatever reason but doesn't have the USDA organic certification. O Organics will really take off if Kroger brings down the prices a bit.
Kroger previously had multiple private label lines for natural/organic (Naturally Preferred, PS Organic, Kroger Organic) and consolidated all of them into Simple Truth. I would take it a step further and convert Simple Truth into a 100% "Organic" AND "free from" brand and move the standard Kroger private label to being the "free from" brand that "Simple Truth" currently is. Then they can use that new "Smartway" label for the products with junk ingredients.

I am curious how O Organics can have much value given how few SKUs it has and how inconsistent those SKUs are by category. The brand is missing in key categories like yogurt, secondary but expected categories like pretzels, yet is over-assorted in categories like tea bags.

I don't see how O Organics can take off, it has too few SKUs and too many holes in its mix. What would take off is discontinuing O Organics immediately and bringing in the much larger, better priced Simple Truth line. Remember how Safeway was trying to sell O Organics products to other retailers? It didn't work out, and there was a reason for that- the line had mix issues and price issues, and still does today.
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote: January 20th, 2023, 12:55 am
HCal wrote: January 19th, 2023, 4:45 pm

Simple Truth isn't a true organic brand. Many of their products are "natural" (which is a totally meaningless term) rather than organic. This causes confusion and annoys customers who feel tricked into paying more for a non-organic product.

At least in Orange County amongst Pavilions shoppers, the O Organics label has a lot of value, and people seem to think it is a major national brand like Horizon. I believe the same is true in the bay area. If the merger goes through, my suggestion would be to use O Organics for the actual organic products, and Simple Truth for the stuff that is being marketed as "natural" or "healthy" for whatever reason but doesn't have the USDA organic certification. O Organics will really take off if Kroger brings down the prices a bit.
Kroger previously had multiple private label lines for natural/organic (Naturally Preferred, PS Organic, Kroger Organic) and consolidated all of them into Simple Truth. I would take it a step further and convert Simple Truth into a 100% "Organic" AND "free from" brand and move the standard Kroger private label to being the "free from" brand that "Simple Truth" currently is. Then they can use that new "Smartway" label for the products with junk ingredients.
Eh. That would probably create more problems than it solves and doesn't fix the issue of things like cereal. General Mills basically had to back off on getting rid of artificial colors and flavors because they weren't able to come up with a suitable replacement for Lucky Charms, and the new Trix looked and tasted like mud. Trix was re-introduced as "Classic Trix" a few years later and the muddy Trix cereal disappeared.
I don't see how O Organics can take off, it has too few SKUs and too many holes in its mix. What would take off is discontinuing O Organics immediately and bringing in the much larger, better priced Simple Truth line. Remember how Safeway was trying to sell O Organics products to other retailers? It didn't work out, and there was a reason for that- the line had mix issues and price issues, and still does today.
I'm pretty sure I've seen O Organics in H-E-B, but the other reason why it didn't last elsewhere was the retailers they were trying to sell it to either had their own organic brand or wanted to develop their own.


Anyway, what's the over/under on Albertsons buying Gongco out of their Food 4 Less store and opening a store there? They have done things like bought other grocers' spaces when they got kicked out...but that would probably still hurt the employees of either store.
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by HCal »

storewanderer wrote: January 20th, 2023, 12:55 am
Kroger previously had multiple private label lines for natural/organic (Naturally Preferred, PS Organic, Kroger Organic) and consolidated all of them into Simple Truth. I would take it a step further and convert Simple Truth into a 100% "Organic" AND "free from" brand and move the standard Kroger private label to being the "free from" brand that "Simple Truth" currently is. Then they can use that new "Smartway" label for the products with junk ingredients.

I am curious how O Organics can have much value given how few SKUs it has and how inconsistent those SKUs are by category. The brand is missing in key categories like yogurt, secondary but expected categories like pretzels, yet is over-assorted in categories like tea bags.
If the merger goes through, the combined company would have access to all the products from both lines. The two lines would be combined, any overlap removed, and then the whole thing could be rebranded.

The reason I'm partial to O Organics is because it has better name recognition in wealthier markets, such as Orange County, parts of LA, and the entire bay area. Simple Truth may be better known in the midwest and south, but are people in Ohio or Georgia really buying that many organic products compared to California?
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by Bluelightspecial »

The irony of this closure is that the Madera location was originally supposed to be a Vons as part of their expansion in that area at the time which included Oakhurst and other stores. When Safeway bought Vons back in the day they decided to make it a Pak N Save, which was probably smart because most of the Vons in that area have closed since the early 90s
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by storewanderer »

HCal wrote: January 20th, 2023, 5:49 pm
storewanderer wrote: January 20th, 2023, 12:55 am
Kroger previously had multiple private label lines for natural/organic (Naturally Preferred, PS Organic, Kroger Organic) and consolidated all of them into Simple Truth. I would take it a step further and convert Simple Truth into a 100% "Organic" AND "free from" brand and move the standard Kroger private label to being the "free from" brand that "Simple Truth" currently is. Then they can use that new "Smartway" label for the products with junk ingredients.

I am curious how O Organics can have much value given how few SKUs it has and how inconsistent those SKUs are by category. The brand is missing in key categories like yogurt, secondary but expected categories like pretzels, yet is over-assorted in categories like tea bags.
If the merger goes through, the combined company would have access to all the products from both lines. The two lines would be combined, any overlap removed, and then the whole thing could be rebranded.

The reason I'm partial to O Organics is because it has better name recognition in wealthier markets, such as Orange County, parts of LA, and the entire bay area. Simple Truth may be better known in the midwest and south, but are people in Ohio or Georgia really buying that many organic products compared to California?
Actually a big reason why Simple Truth has been so successful is because the way Kroger has handled the brand does have a lot of consumers in Ohio and Georgia buying these products. By pricing these items just moderately like .10-.50 higher than the standard Kroger brand item, you would be very surprised how many customers in the midwest will take the Simple Truth Organic item instead of a national brand or instead of a Kroger brand. I have personally found some items in Simple Truth Organic that are far better quality than a comparable Kroger brand item as well. It isn't every customer but it is enough customers to produce very significant sales for this product line, the most successful product line Kroger has ever created. If you spend time in the stores that run the core Kroger programs successfully (Smiths, Frys, Dillons, King Soopers) and observe shoppers you will understand just how strong this product line is. Ralphs with smaller stores does not seem to slot as many SKUs of the line or does not display it as well in many cases, but the other issue I noticed in Ralphs was they seem to have a lot of issues with out of stocks on these products often getting one row of space (not sure if that means they're flying off the shelves or Ralphs is not stocking efficiently). FoodsCo is a total joke with this line, yes there are items, but not many.

I took a hard walk through Smiths tonight and looked very closely at the Simple Truth line in food categories. Looking at specifically food categories (including dairy), I estimate 85% of the Simple Truth items present in food/dairy are Simple Truth Organic. These items say "Organic" in very large letters on the package (the "Simple Truth" part is much smaller). If you removed the "Organic" items from Simple Truth, there would not be enough products left to have a meaningful product line.

There are a lot of other odd Simple Truth items that are non-Organic like paper towels, some drug, and some baby non-consumables that are a little strange and I am sure have very slow sales. Also I have no idea how you can have Organic Seltzer Water but some supplier is making Simple Truth Organic Seltzer Water and it is tasty.

So I do not expect O Organics to continue long term under Kroger. The problem is in the 40 stores you define where O Organics is so successful, there are hundreds of other stores out there where O Organics is a complete loser of a brand, the product is not assorted properly, does not move well, and has a lot of shrink/spoilage. I also expect to see a significant number of these stores you cite where O Organics is successful to be divested. I have not personally seen stores where O Organics is successful in many years, back when Safeway was developing and pushing the line hard in conjunction with Lifestyle remodels and a few years after was the last time I saw that line having any degree of success. Now, even in NorCal, I see short dates constantly on O Organics products throughout the store including dry grocery. Products are being discontinued constantly. I am getting those $1 off any O Organic Item coupons all the time in the app and I often have trouble finding anything to buy either due to the poor mix or the terrible pricing and this is a problem at every single Safeway/Albertsons banner I visit, no matter the region; there is no region that somehow has this O Organics line going better than the others, the brand is lost everywhere. The customers who bought that stuff back in the few years after the Lifestyle remodels eventually figured out Safeway was ripping them off and have moved on to Trader Joe's or Whole Foods or even Sprouts who all have a better mix of generic Organics for lower prices and haven't looked back. The failure of Albertsons to develop a consistent, successful private label program like Kroger has across the board has really held them back but will be a moot point soon as the messed up (90% of their problem was lousy pricing/constantly promoting name brand cheaper than private labels which led to low velocity) Safeway private label program rides off into the sunset once and for all.

Perhaps SpinCo can have the brand (they'd be better off just going with Wild Harvest from UNFI, which is popping up in quite a few places; noticed Natural Grocers has some Wild Harvest items now too). When Kroger started to roll its own brands products into Harris Teeter and Mariano's/Pick N Save, the very first thing they did getting their items into those stores, was get the Simple Truth products into those stores. This is a high priority because this is a really, really strong product line.
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Re: Pak N Save Madera closing 1/14

Post by storewanderer »

Bluelightspecial wrote: January 20th, 2023, 7:49 pm The irony of this closure is that the Madera location was originally supposed to be a Vons as part of their expansion in that area at the time which included Oakhurst and other stores. When Safeway bought Vons back in the day they decided to make it a Pak N Save, which was probably smart because most of the Vons in that area have closed since the early 90s
Madera Pak N Save opened in 1992 (and had its original interior until the 2022 remodel), so I am not sure this was a situation related to Safeway merging with Vons or a situation where Vons was already having trouble in the Fresno market and decided not to proceed with a new store and let Safeway take this Madera building and Safeway opened to make it a Pak N Save.

Safeway NorCal let go of its 2 Fresno Safeways (really awful outdated stores) and 1 Fresno Pak N Save (big place that should have been high volume) in 1996-1997ish and they went to Save Mart in exchange for some Vallejo Save Marts. I was always interested why Madera stayed. I assumed overlap reasons, similar to that Lodi Lucky staying as Lucky Stores surrounding it got sold to Save Mart.
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