The supermarket chain is selectively closing further locations for strategic reasons.
Author’s Note
This article is based on corporate postings and accredited media reports. Linked information within this article is attributed to the following outlets: Mashed.com, Kroger.com, MacroTrends.net, Courier-Journal.com, TheKrogerCo.com, and The State Journal-Register.
Introduction
In December of 2021, Mashed.com published an article titled “Why Kroger Might Not Survive 2022.” The article was as blunt in its assessment as it was in its title: Kroger may seem like a grocery chain that's too big too fail, but could 2022 bring detrimental change to this food giant? September of 2021 saw the grocer's shares drop by 9.1%, per Reuters. Executives have attributed wastage, discounts, and the global supply chain disruption to these falling numbers. "Consistent with many retailers, we experienced supply chain constraints and increased warehouse and transportation costs during the quarter," Kroger chief financial officer Gary Millerchip said in a call with shareholders, adding that higher supply-induced costs are expected to persist well into the new year.
Today, nearly 11 months later, the company does not appear to be in any danger of going out of business and yet individual locations continue to shutter for strategic reasons.
Let us explore further.
Kroger, 2022
I have written several articles on the Kroger chain for NewsBreak. “Plans For Kroger Closings in 2022” was published in April of this year, and featured an excerpt from “Popular Chain Stores Scheduled to Close in 2022,” my earlier article discussing current plans for some of our country’s highest-performing retailers.
The excerpt utilized was the following: Kroger is one of the nation’s largest retail companies. Among their holdings are Food 4 Less, Kroger (supermarket), Ralphs, and King Soopers. See here for a complete profile of the “Kroger Family of Companies,” from Kroger.com... For year-to-year Kroger financial statements to 2021, see MacroTrends.net listing here. In brief, the company’s 2021 revenue is listed as $132,498 billion, regardless of the recent closings.
A new closure has been announced of late.
According to Courier-Journal.com, in its piece entitled “A Louisville-Area Kroger is Closing its Doors in 2 Weeks, With Employees to be Relocated,” the closure has been deemed a necessary loss: The Kroger grocery store in New Albany will close its doors on Oct. 7, a spokesperson for the company confirmed Friday. Jessica Sharp, a company representative, said the 75 employees who work at the store, located at 3400 Grant Line Road in the Southern Indiana city, will be offered positions at other Kroger locations in the region. She said the store is closing because it was not making enough profit. "The store has struggled to be profitable for many years and the financial projections for future years trended worse than anticipated and forced us to make this difficult decision," Sharp said.
Per TheKrogerCo.com, Kroger as a parent entity presently owns the following: The Kroger Co. operates grocery retail stores under the following banners: Supermarkets – Kroger, Ralphs, Dillons, Smith's, King Soopers, Fry's, QFC, City Market, Owen's, Jay C, Pay Less, Baker's, Gerbes, Harris Teeter, Pick 'n Save, Metro Market, Mariano's, and Multi-department stores.
All stores under the Kroger banner are scrutinized for performance, and several of their locations remain vulnerable.
Finally, The State Journal-Register features an article about a Taylorville, Illinois location that remains closed due to asbestos reasons, which had been expected by many to reopen sooner.
Conclusion
Kroger consistently has borne the brunt of concern and at times poor publicity, the latter most recently during the “hero pay” era when they elected to close stores as opposed to paying temporary but mandated raises. This was covered in my above-linked articles. The national supply chain issue, meantime, had impacted grocery chains nationwide, but Kroger, in part due to its size and its holdings, had been particularly impacted across the board.
The company, as stated earlier, is not in financial trouble, though individual locations will continue to close likely due to underperformance issues.
In the event of any updates I will post them here, on NewsBreak.
Thank you for reading.
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