Supermarket Mergers That Should Have Happened (or not?)

[Stork of The Weak]

Here are five mergers that would seem to have been perfect:

1. Acme-Penn Fruit

2. A&P/Super Fresh-Food Fair/Pantry Pride

3. Pathmark-Grand Union

4. Safeway-Kroger

5. Albertsons-Ahold

Folks, could I have your opinions on these?

[Joeg]

I totally agree with all of them!!

[Stork of The Weak]

Thanks. But for everyone let me explain why I find these to be great ideas, which I meant to do last night. First of all Acme was by far the most successful supermarket chain in the Philadelphia region in the 60's and 70's, who upgraded older stores at the perfect times. Penn Fruit on the other hand was a great chain in the 50's, but was struggling to keep up with competition during the 60's and 70's.

Also even though A&P was a much larger chain than Food Fair/Pantry Pride, it seems Food Fair Inc kept up much better with upgrading older stores during the 70's than A&P did.

Pathmark and Grand Union both overlapped in the NYC area, but seemed to stay out of each other's way, but both chains could have benefited from being in more places. I'm surprised Pathmark still exists yet Grand Union went out of business. Of the two, Grand Union was the chain with much nicer stores.

Safeway and Kroger both managed to coexist for a long time in states such as Texas and Louisiana, and while Safeway has been in those states but focused on the Western states, and at the same time had a presence in the Baltimore/DC area, they seemed to magically stay out of Kroger territory in both Virginia/North Carolina and the Great Lakes region of the Midwest. So the point here is that both Safeway and Kroger are very spread out, yet it seems both have gone out of their way to avoid one another as much as possible, even though a merger would make more sense. I'm sure a merger would be challenged by the FTC somehow though.

Finally, Albertsons and Ahold would go together because so far Ahold has not had any presence in the Gulf Coast states or the Western states. Also Albertsons has never been in the Mid-Atlantic region except for the stores they bought from Acme, which was a bad move on Albertsons part just because Acme had closed so many stores before the merger with Albertsons. On top of this, most Acme stores that Albertsons DID acquire were very difficult and expensive to convert to the more upscale Albertsons format. Acme while I must say "bless their heart" due to their rich history has been lagging behind the competition in terms of quality for many years. The Giant chain in PA owned by Ahold, known as Martin's in a few other states, has outdone Acme in so many ways. Also the Genuardi's chain that was owned by Safeway was a huge step above Acme, but now has been sold to Giant. On top of this, ShopRite and Wegmans each have Acme beat, with ShopRite in Philadelphia County in PA and many places in NJ beating Acme on price, and Wegmans having stores that are so much larger and more upscale than Acme in many suburbs.

Also even though Albertsons and Safeway both made a huge effort to modernize their store fleet during the late 90's and early 2000s, they seem to have both been ailing even though Ahold with very similar stores has been growing and growing with much success. On the same topic it seems that both Stop & Shop (the best Ahold chain in my opinion) and ShopRite will each buy a number of the biggest and best A&P stores in the NYC suburbs someday, in the event that A&P finally does collapse once and for all.

[MikeRa]

Thanks. But for everyone let me explain why I find these to be great ideas, which I meant to do last night.  Also even though A&P was a much larger chain than Food Fair/Pantry Pride, it seems Food Fair Inc kept up much better with upgrading older stores during the 70's than A&P did.

This merger may have worked if they merged in the early 70's, but by the late 1970's, Food Fair/Pantry Pride/Penn Fruit by Pantry Pride was on it's way to bankruptcy.  Which is probally why they shuttered the J. M. Fields Department Stores, as well as the Philadelphia and Baltimore area stores.  It also didn't help that Food Fair bought the last 17 Penn Fruit stores after that supermarket chain went under.