Sunday, May 1, 2011

News Break:

Acme to layoff 900 employees

The news was reported on several webstites this past week. Thanks to all for sending in the links. The layoffs are set to occur on May 7th. Acme President Dan Sanders was quoted as saying, "Unfortunately, we have more associates than we need to serve our current level of sales, and we must take immediate action to change our business." Interesting, the articles report that Acme is still number  1 in the Philly market with an 18% share. ShopRite is never included in these reports due to it being a cooperative based company. Kinda ridiculous. Regardless of it's business model it's still a regular ol' grocery store competing with other grocery stores. 

Philly.com

Dailylocal.com

Bizjournals.com

R.I.P. ACME Brand

The day has come... SuperValu has announced it will be eliminating Acme brand. Well, what's left of it anyway. Rumors of this plan have been floating around for a while now and SuperValu made it official yesterday. All store brands within each banner will be retired in favor of the company's new "Essential Everyday" branded products. This will allow the company huge savings from not having to produce banner specific packaging and marketing strategies. It is quite possible that it could lead to further erosion of store loyalty among customers. If SuperValu is smart they'll follow Publix's lead of creating high quality products in stylish packaging that compete with the brand pricing of Walmart's Great Value brand. Publix has one of the most successful private label brands in the country. A Google image search revealed no previews for the product line. I'll post links as they become available. You can read more about the news at bizjournals.com.

A&P to sell 25 Super Fresh stores

As mentioned in the comments below, news about A&P selling off some Super Fresh stores hit about 2 weeks ago. A&P is looking to complete the sale within the next 2 months. There has been no word on potential buyers. You can read more about it at supermarketnews.com.

Posted by

11 comments:

  1. MaxMay 2, 2011 at 8:38 PM

    This is terrible news about the Acme layoffs.

    Please forgive me for rudely switching the subject (as I don't know where else to discuss this), but while the webmaster was on his well-deserved vacation, there was more bad news from A&P: the company plans to sell 25 Superfresh locations (1 in DC, 2 in DE, and 22 in MD) to other chains. It is unknown if all of these stores will be sold to the same chain, or if they will be broken up store-by-store.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousMay 2, 2011 at 10:13 PM

    Kind of ironically, the Wilmington area Super Fresh units are staying Super Fresh. I don't know how the New Castle/Collins Park one has stayed open so long. This store started as an A&P in the 50's, then got a major remodel in 1976, but closed in 1982, and soon reopened as Super Fresh. Now it has the circa 2002 Super Fresh logo. But the neighborhood is TERRIBLE!

    ReplyDelete
  3. MaxMay 4, 2011 at 6:30 PM

    When I read the news about the Acme brand being eliminated, my heart started racing, because I initially misinterpreted the news to mean that the entire Acme name was being retired on all stores (as opposed to the actual news that store products carrying the Acme brand name will no longer exist). Sadly, I fear that one day SuperValu will completely ditch the Acme name and rebrand all stores with one of its other banners.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousMay 5, 2011 at 11:58 AM

    hate to tell you max, but i have the same fear. you should see what they have posted in employees views only. all i can say is save-a-lot is all supervalu really cares about, and non-union chains. acme is a dead horse to them.

    ReplyDelete
  5. MikeRaMay 5, 2011 at 2:51 PM

    They would most likely use the "SuperValu" name as a store name if they were to ditch the Acme/Albertsons/Cub/Hornbacher's/Jewel/Shop 'N Save/Shaw's/Shoppers/Star banners

    ReplyDelete
  6. AnonymousMay 7, 2011 at 10:58 PM

    http://www.trentonian.com/content/articles/2011/02/15/news/doc4d59bbe4870f0938566959.jpg

    yardville acme

    ReplyDelete
  7. AnonymousMay 8, 2011 at 7:25 PM

    actualt it is writtemn rigth in the Acme Handbook that super valu goal is to open 1600 new Sav a lots and to maimtain its margins.

    ReplyDelete
  8. AnonymousMay 8, 2011 at 7:31 PM

    It is only 900 Part time employees. This saves them 4 million dollars. This has more to do with forcing full time department heads, meat cutters amd rank and file to work evenings. to replace these 16 hour per week workers. Sanders tried and failed to get the unions to agree to this So, its time to after the kids, There really is no known cure for stupid and Dan The Man is proof of this.

    ReplyDelete
  9. AnonymousMay 10, 2011 at 1:06 PM

    this has more to do with that they are making room for legally binded contracted longer-term employees by seniority as they continue to close more stores seen as "non-performing" ... sad times for once one of the best companies to work for!

    ReplyDelete
  10. AnonymousMay 11, 2011 at 4:01 PM

    Will any superfreshes be left after the sale?

    ReplyDelete
  11. AnonymousMay 14, 2011 at 9:33 PM

    acme is a great place to work! they offer great benefits and pay compared to places like walmarts and...uh, whatever else is left!

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)