H-E-B - Gets top US grocer spot - Can Illinois get them to come? (Chicago: appointed, prices)

[atler8]

Originally Posted by damba

Meh. They can’t compete in Chicago.

Why not? I'd be interested to know details you can bring in so as to back up your thoughts?

From what I've seen in Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota & in Illinois, both Hy-Vee & Festival have the potential to bring a new & better sense of quality offerings, customer service & physical plants into the Chicagoland grocery playing field.

[damba]

Originally Posted by atler8

Why not? I'd be interested to know details you can bring in so as to back up your thoughts?

From what I've seen in Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota & in Illinois, both Hy-Vee & Festival have the potential to bring a new & better sense of quality offerings, customer service & physical plants into the Chicagoland grocery playing field.

Achieving all of that costs a lot of cash- a lot more to locate here. Any employee owned grocer would have to be extremely willing to finance their own high risk venture into an already crowded Chicagoland grocery space. It is an ‘interesting’ <ahem> idea that Hy-Vee is necessarily unique enough to capture excess capacity (where, pray tell??) or convince enough (arguably) higher end shoppers to abandoned their current two grocers (typically, it’s two).

[Hiruko]

What do we need besides Sunset, Whole Foods, Mariano's, and Heinen's? Jeez...I have all four within 10 minutes.

[KerrTown]

Originally Posted by damba

Achieving all of that costs a lot of cash- a lot more to locate here. Any employee owned grocer would have to be extremely willing to finance their own high risk venture into an already crowded Chicagoland grocery space.

There aren't many grocers. Jewel always had a second-rate competitor. Before Mariano's, it was Dominick's. If Kroger's Peoria division starts encroaching into the West/SW suburbs from Ottawa, Jewel might be the second-rate competitor this time.

[damba]

Originally Posted by Hiruko

What do we need besides Sunset, Whole Foods, Mariano's, and Heinen's? Jeez...I have all four within 10 minutes.

Ditto. And now also Woodman’s (for a few WI offerings) plus a few Kosher items I get at the Jewel deli in HP
(Plus TJ’s by the Edens!)

To compete in that space is excruciatingly difficult.

[damba]

Originally Posted by KerrTown

There aren't many grocers. Jewel always had a second-rate competitor. Before Mariano's, it was Dominick's. If Kroger's Peoria division starts encroaching into the West/SW suburbs from Ottawa, Jewel might be the second-rate competitor this time.

Sure there are, in the sense that in most of Chicagoland, you will find more than the prior ‘duopoly’ of Jewel or Dominick’s. No, in the sense that there are less total grocery firms vs other industries’ offerings.

Kroger really doesn’t need to encroach with so many of their Mariano’s already here. They have already started tweaking things. That said, the ‘gloom and doom’ from many Mariano’s fans in Chicagoland is really mostly fluff IMMSHO. Mariano’s is still so much preferable to Jewel, regardless of any sort of Kroger rebranding present now. Jewel is a funny one. They can’t apparently find lighting consultants to advise them on appropriate bulb color temperatures at updated locations (pointing to you, Lake/Cook rd jewel at Waukegan rd). Ugh.

[atler8]

Originally Posted by damba

Achieving all of that costs a lot of cash- a lot more to locate here. Any employee owned grocer would have to be extremely willing to finance their own high risk venture into an already crowded Chicagoland grocery space. It is an ‘interesting’ <ahem> idea that Hy-Vee is necessarily unique enough to capture excess capacity (where, pray tell??) or convince enough (arguably) higher end shoppers to abandoned their current two grocers (typically, it’s two).

As you are aware, this is how breaking a food chain into a new market is often accomplished: Via the purchase of part or all of an already existing grocery chain which decides to lower it's presence or eliminate it completely in a given market.

As such, with the grocery market already a competitive one with narrow margins, a move into a market is often accomplished not by coming into a market cold & hoping to pick off the crumbs, but rather through the purchase of a block of store locations that already are in place & reworking the former physical plant.

As for example, the news found in the 2018 & 2019 articles linked 1stly & 2ndly below was a blockbuster of a shock in the Twin Cities when Cub Foods, their long time #1 locally-based grocery chain, announced their intent to diminish & perhaps eventually eliminate their presence there.

A Chicagoland example of such turmoil brought on by the turnover of a major player in the grocery business was the sale of the long-standing Dominick's chain & the Safeway debacle that followed which has left a number of former store spaces still sitting in the dark.

As for your idea of a "unique"-to-the-market grocery retailer, look over the very basic Wikipedia article linked 3rdly below that describes the Hy-Vee chain history & shows the multitude of forward-thinking moves & concepts that Hy-vee has brought to the marketplace which has driven their growth into 8 states, including Illinois.

As for Illinois specifically, the 4th link describes the 2010 opening of an 84,000 sq. foot Hy-Vee store in Peoria at which time was the 13th one in Illinois.
Currently, there are 19 such stores in Illinois & the largest store in the entire chain is in Bloomington with 108,000 sq. feet.

I think they already have Chicagoland in their sites what with their closest presence being in Sycamore. And given the completeness of what they offer with their store concept, the addition of Hy-Vee would be a plus for the local grocery scene.

https://patch.com/minnesota/stillwat...ub-food-stores


https://bringmethenews.com/minnesota...n-the-new-year


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hy-Vee


https://progressivegrocer.com/hy-vee...ore-plans-more

[japster28]

Grocery stores are very regional. Doubtful HEB will come unless they expand significantly. It is sad that Mariano's got so much worse after the Kroger acquisition. It's not bad, but not what it used to be. There are some fantastic southern grocery stores. Wegman's, Publix, and HEB come to mind.

If you are a Glenview resident, I used to go to Heinen's, it was pretty great!

Nowadays I just go to Jewel, because Mariano's doesn't provide a significantly better experience for the price. I also hit up Costco occasionally, H Mart and Seafood City for Asian products, and Fresh Farms for Polish stuff.

[CCrest182]

Originally Posted by reppin_the_847

This... My friend in Texas raves about H-E-B, but we know the market for grocery stores is saturated in Chicagoland. If anything the trend has been for places to pare down & maybe shift a bit more boutique style in Illinois. Look at the demise of Dominicks (part of Safeway Inc.). As far as big players you're pretty much down to Jewel-Osco & Mariano's (which was acquired by grocery giant Kroger). There are a lot of interesting, smaller boutique style grocery / produce stores scattered throughout Chicagoland that can procure most things via a few large distributors.

I wouldn't say the grocery store market here is "saturated", but I would agree that there isn't a huge demand for another big chain to enter the market. If they did come here, it almost certainly wouldn't be a massive presence, and would probably be restricted to some suburbs on the edge of the area. Some examples exist, like Woodman's, which has a location in North Aurora, and Strack & Van Til has multiple locations in Northwest Indiana.

All there really is for grocery places (for the entire area) is Jewel and Mariano's. I do think there's room in some parts of the metro for more competition.

A HEB would be nice, but I also would love to see HyVee come to Chicago; it's amazing that a big Midwestern chain like HyVee, has zero presence in the area. I've been to a few of their locations in nearby states as well as downstate, and it's an excellent place to shop with great selection, food, and service. Honestly, I might even say I'd trade the current state of Mariano's for HyVee to invade the market. If I'm not mistaken, all their locations are open 24 hours; something that would make the place standout against Jewel and Mariano's, both of which have open and closing times.

[CCrest182]

Originally Posted by Hiruko

What do we need besides Sunset, Whole Foods, Mariano's, and Heinen's? Jeez...I have all four within 10 minutes.

I'm in the west suburbs. I only recognized two of those names. Sunset and Heinens must only be found in the North Shore