Giant Eagle pulls plug on Good Cents chain

[retailisking]

Like Delhaize found out with Bottom Dollar, it's hard to make money in the hard discount supermarket business
http://www.post-gazette.com/business/2015/02/25/Giant-Eagle-to-close-its-Good-Cents-locations/stories/201502250236

[TheFugitive]

In order to pull it off you have to become Aldi.  An extreme model of German efficiency.

I have seen my local Aldi store operate on the very busiest days with no more
than five employees.

[retailisking]

It certainly CAN be done profitably with a larger footprint, as PriceRite has shown (and it's even profitable enough to license to Wakefern's co-op members) but that's the exception to the rule.

[jason83080]

There were two problems with the Good Cents model as it stood: Firstly, it was essentially a stripped-down Giant Eagle. It tried to parrot the Save-A-Lot model more than it did Aldi, which is good in theory, unless you basically place your discount stores NEXT TO the main Giant Eagle locations. (Brooklyn's location was in the old Tops building, right down the street from a brand-new Giant Eagle; Parma's was right next door, in the old GE storefront.) When you're undercutting yourself by 20c-30c on some products (and, at times, Good Cents was MORE expensive than the main store's pricing), it's not really worth going there, when you can just go next door to the main store and pay, basically, the same thing.

That brings me to problem #2: LOCATION. Giant Eagle could have killed it here in NEOH with the Good Cents name. We've got enough abandoned Tops, smaller Giant Eagle, Walmart, Kmart, and other storefronts that are some pallet-stock away from becoming Good Cents stores. A year or so ago, I actually e-mailed GE with an idea to expand Good Cents throughout Lorain County, naming exact locations that they could utilize. Nothing came of it, and the old Super Kmart in Elyria is now under reconstruction into "At Home" home furnishings. GE's Good Cents stores - all four of them - were nowhere near most people. If you're going to try and be Aldi or Save-A-Lot, you need to put forth the effort and build up your brand.

I suppose I can take that Shopper Card out of my wallet and off of my keyring now...