Lack of grocery stores in Austin / suburbs (San Marcos, Georgetown: sales, credit)

[Mudd]

What's with the grocery store situation here? It seems like you on have HEB's here, with the occasional Randall's around Austin. I live in Georgetown, and it's ridiculous, the grocery store situation here, with our only options within 20 minutes being a trashed HEB at 29 and I-35, dealing with Walmart people, or driving to the HEB on Williams which is constantly packed. Why are there not a LOT more grocery stores here? We have actually driven 40 minutes (each way) to either the Randall's in Cedar Park, or Whole Foods at the Arboretum, just for quality groceries.

[HappyTexan]

There's not a whole lot of Grocery chains here in central Texas. I think you named them with HEB, Randall's and the old Albertson's as the staples in any town.

Some towns, like Hutto, don't even have a single grocery store so I guess you are lucky to have 3 up there in Georgetown.

[Alatex]

That was one of the most surprising things to me about San Marcos.
I saw a couple HEBs, and that was it for regular grocery stores (not counting stuff like Wal-Mart).

I'd have expected about 6 or 8 grocery stores for a city of 50,000 people.

[neddy]

You should try the HEB plus off 2243 in Leander only takes my friends about 15mins to drive from GT to there for food.

[love roses]

HappyTexan is sooo right. I could get every resident here to tell you how annoying it is to have no store here. Every town around us has at least 1 or more than one...Brats!!!

[gigi927]

I hear ya. We lived WAY farther out of town in Phoenix than we do in Austin, and I had 4 grocery stores within 5 minutes of my house there. People talk about how our HEB wasn't even there about 3 years ago (near Steiner/River Place). It was a thrill to get Super WAlMart a few months back just to have another option, even though I don't get produce or meats there!

I would kill for a nice Randall's closer to us. I just don't like HEB that much. The organization of the stores just doesn't seem well thought out and I don't think their sales are as good as Randall's/Safeway's. I'm a Safeway gal at heart!

[Trainwreck20]

The problem is, or has been, that Albertson's (and the old Safeways) couldn't compete with HEB on quality, although price was similar. The Randalls have as good or better (depending entirely on who you ask) quality, but don't really try to compete on price. Only so much room in the market for that niche. The HEBs vary enormously, from very nice stores to pretty run-down looking. Most of that is due to the fact that HEB expands on cash, not credit, and historically has grown very slowly and very economically. They seem to have hit a critical mass, though, in the last few years and are growing much more rapidly that they did in the previous era.

We have a Randalls about 3 miles away, and an HEB about 1/4 mile away. When we do not want to deal with a crowd, we go to Randalls . My only issue there (and it really is stupid) is that they advertise their great savings using their Randall's card....when really, you pay an incredible markup if you don't use it. I think they were charging something like $4.50 a pound for ground meat once, but you "saved" something like $2/lb by using their card. In the end, the price is not that much higher than HEB, but the gaul of having that base price just irks me.

[gigi927]

Originally Posted by Trainwreck20

The problem is, or has been, that Albertson's (and the old Safeways) couldn't compete with HEB on quality, although price was similar. The Randalls have as good or better (depending entirely on who you ask) quality, but don't really try to compete on price. Only so much room in the market for that niche. The HEBs vary enormously, from very nice stores to pretty run-down looking. Most of that is due to the fact that HEB expands on cash, not credit, and historically has grown very slowly and very economically. They seem to have hit a critical mass, though, in the last few years and are growing much more rapidly that they did in the previous era.

We have a Randalls about 3 miles away, and an HEB about 1/4 mile away. When we do not want to deal with a crowd, we go to Randalls . My only issue there (and it really is stupid) is that they advertise their great savings using their Randall's card....when really, you pay an incredible markup if you don't use it. I think they were charging something like $4.50 a pound for ground meat once, but you "saved" something like $2/lb by using their card. In the end, the price is not that much higher than HEB, but the gaul of having that base price just irks me.

Interesting that you have such a different perspective about Safeway/Randall's and the pricing. Even though Phoenix generally has a higher cost of living than Austin, it seems that my groceries from Safeway there were always less than the groceries I get at HEB here (I don't have a Randall's close enough to really compare apples to apples, tho). For example - HEB never puts milk on sale, ever (and blames the dairies for it). Yet Safeway routinely does buy one get one free or 2 for $5. I've also seen some meat prices here, in what I would think is Beef Central USA, that are ridiculously high compared to what we were paying in Phoenix....

While I like the meal deals and the combo loco offers at HEB, I seem to often just get crap I don't really need. I'd give all of them up to pay less for milk!

[jwb123]

Yeah in the Seattle area the Safeway (Randall's here) is the "cheap" grocery store... here, Randalls, I hear, is considered upscale? Weird.

I love HEB though.

[achtungpv]

Randalls is way more expensive than HEB. it's borderline ridiculous. I went yesterday to buy a 12-pack of DP to replenish our office fridge and it was $7.99 at Randalls.

I guess it's the only way Randalls stays open with the lack of traffic they get. It is nice not having anyone in line in front of you. I dunno if it's worth the 40% markup though.