Effect on Washington of Kroger-Albertson Merger

[SusVelo]

Nothing good will come of this for consumers unfortunately.

[RMESMH]

Originally Posted by jabogitlu

Oops, didn't realize more info/news had been posted.

https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/...ivestment.html

As part of the deal, Kroger will no longer use the QFC brand name. Stores the company will retain that carry the QFC brand name will be rebranded to a different company-owned brand. The company will also no longer use the brand names Mariano's (located in the Chicago area) or Carrs (an Albertsons' subsidiary based in Alaska).

In Arizona, California, Wyoming and Colorado, C&S will take on the Albertsons name. For Albertsons locations Kroger is keeping in those states, the stores will be renamed Kroger.

Some of the private label brands Kroger will no longer use include: Debi Lilly Design, Primo Taglio, Open Nature, ReadyMeals and Waterfront Bistro.

The deal could be expand to include as many as 237 additional stores if regulators require Kroger to sell off a greater number of locations in order to get the green light for its Albertsons deal.

Interesting.

I moved from California to the Houston metro in the late 2000s.

Safeway already owned Randalls (a chain here), so my Safeway club card works there.

We had a few Albertsons here, but they went away (before Albertsons bought Safeway, IIRC).

Albertsons buying Safeway didn't change anything customer wise re the relationship between Safeway and Randalls.

Our 'main' chains here (I'd guess that have the most stores) are Walmart, Kroger, and HEB (a Texas chain that also has a footprint in Mexico and is one of the largest privately held companies in the U.S.).

Randalls has a smaller footprint. We also have Fiesta (34 of their 51 supermarkets are in the Houston metro), Food Town, Sprouts, Whole Foods, Aldi, Costco, Sam's Club, and (since 2012) Trader Joe's. There also might be a few Brookshire Brothers on the outskirts, but I've mostly seen those in other parts of Texas. I may be leaving out a few other small ones.

I hope that Kroger buying Albertsons only changes things 'behind the scenes' here (things that customers don't see), so that there's not some new caveat/monkey wrench between Randalls and Kroger.

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by Diana Holbrook

I'd think they'll keep operating under their current, familiar names. I don't see a lot of reason to go to the expense of converting branding.

But what do I know?

In parts of the Southwest, Safeway-Albertson's already got renamed about 5 years ago, to something like"Country Market", something generic-sounding.

My former neighborhood in north Seattle had/has a Safeway along 15th Av. NE, that always was run-down and poor quality. After QFC moved to within a couple of blocks west of 15h NE, and spruced up all their the stores, renting out space to concessions like Cinnabon and NY Bagels, business boomed. This was before even Fred Meyer acquired it, long before Kroger.

I think shoppers in that, and adjacent neighborhoods would be pretty ticked off, if suddenly they were stuck with only Safeway. If Kroger sells off the QFC property, hopefully some other non-Kroger store would move in. Sprouts, maybe? There is no health-food grocer in that general area at all, currently. I'm not keen on Sprouts, but they're cheaper than Whole Foods, whose price points I don't think shoppers in that area would support.

I think there are a number of neighborhoods around Seattle, where Safeway and QFC were competing, and QFC was the runaway winner before Kroger got it. If Kroger sloughs off QFC, it makes one question why they even bought it in the first place, only to trash what had become a highly successful brand, then eventually dump it. Someone should consider reviving QFC as an independent brand. Hey, there's an idea!