The Friday Checkout is a weekly column providing more insight on the news, rounding up the announcements you may have missed and sharing what’s to come.
Eager for growth yet limited in the number of places where they can build a new 60,000-square-foot store, grocers have tried their hand at new formats in recent years.
These locations are typically smaller than their traditional stores and often have a specific selling angle, like an urban specialty shop, a neighborhood market or a discount store. The concepts are exciting, but their track record so far hasn’t been great — a fact underscored by the demise of Schnuck Markets’ EatWell, a specialty store format the regional grocer established in 2020 during the height of the pandemic.
EatWell, which operates just two stores, joins a litany of other brands in the dustbin of alternative store concepts. These include Publix’s GreenWise Markets, Whole Foods’ 365 stores, Kroger’s Main & Vine and Ahold Delhaize's Bfresh.
Other grocers launched new formats to great fanfare and haven’t talked about them ever since. Meijer hasn’t uttered a peep about expanding its Meijer Grocery concept that debuted early last year, and Hy-Vee and The Giant Company have been similarly quiet about their small-format stores.
To be sure, these are austere times for grocers, who have been plowing money into lowering prices and reducing operational costs and are less focused on innovations that may or may not pan out with shoppers.
But finding and scaling new business opportunities would also relieve the pressure that grocers are feeling right now. Their struggles to establish new formats show their limited ability to operate outside of the bread-and-butter supermarket format that is creating so much of that pressure.
One alternative format that has been very successful is one that will grate on grocers’ nerves: Walmart Neighborhood Market. Since launching in 1998, the format has grown to nearly 700 stores across the U.S. It has a new leader and is opening new stores and revamping existing ones as part of a major update over the next five years.
In case you missed it
Amazon Fresh shows signs of growth
Amazon is planning to open an Amazon Fresh location in Elk Grove, California, before the end of 2024, the Sacramento Business Journal reported on Wednesday. Amazon has also filed plans with state alcohol regulators for a second Fresh store in the Sacramento area that also appears on track to open by the end of the year, the news outlet said, adding that regulatory filings indicate that two more Fresh stores are also in the works for the region.
The company said last November that it intended to move forward with the Fresh concept, a disclosure that followed its announcement in early 2023 that it would stop adding stores to the chain while it examined ways to set the chain apart from other grocers as well as improve its financial performance.
Tops Friendly Markets’ memorial design finalized
Officials in New York state have settled on the design for a memorial to honor the victims of the mass shooting at a Tops Friendly Markets store in Buffalo, New York, on May 14, 2022. The design, selected by the 5/14 Memorial Commission from among 20 submissions, features 10 interconnected pillars inscribed with the names of the victims and survivors of the racially motivated attack at the supermarket, according to a Monday announcement from the office of New York Gov. Kathy Hochul. The memorial will also include a building for educational activities, exhibitions and other events.
On Tuesday, Tops dedicated an Honor Space in memory of the victims of the attack. The space includes a sculpture, 10 granite honor bollards and benches.
Avoiding hunger is getting more expensive
People facing hunger needed an extra $24.73 per week in 2022 to avoid food insecurity, an increase of 9.5% after adjusting for price increases, Feeding America announced Wednesday. The figure is at its highest level in two decades, the organization’s Map the Meal Gap study found.
More than 44 million people in the United States were food insecure in 2022, representing about 13% of the country’s population, the study found. The average cost per meal for people in that group rose 3% during the year, to $3.99, according to the research, which received support from the Conagra Brands Foundation and consumer intelligence company NIQ.
Number of the week: 1.1%
That was the annual pace of grocery inflation during April, down from 1.2% in March, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Wednesday.
What’s ahead
BJ’s delivers earnings
The club retailer is scheduled to report its results for the first quarter of 2024 on Thursday.
Impulse find
Home is where your grocery store is
A Michigan woman was living a quaint life. Her humble abode, which she resided in for almost a year, had flooring, a home office complete with a computer and desk, a Keurig and a pantry, according to an NBC news report.
The location — the rooftop sign of a Family Fare supermarket.
She was discovered in late April by contractors who followed an extension cord on the roof of the building where they were working, according to a local news report. They notified the police in Midland, Michigan, and authorities told her she was not allowed to live inside the grocery store’s sign. Police reported she left without incident.
Authorities offered to help the woman with housing assistance but she declined, according to a local news report, which also reported the woman has a job, just not at Family Fare. The grocery store also said they would work with the woman to get her furniture, the news outlet noted.
The woman, who police did not identify, was not formally charged with living in the Family Fare sign, however, one mystery remains — how she was getting onto the roof.
