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The changing grocery scene

For many years, Cedar Mill shoppers have had three choices for nearby grocery stores: Bales Marketplace (Thriftway), Safeway, and Albertsons. Just last month, Market of Choice (MOC) opened in the Timberland Center. This high-end store, sometimes described as a cross between Zupan’s and New Seasons, offers a range of products from “regular old grocery” items, to organic products, to a vast array of ready-to-eat dishes prepared onsite. The beautiful environment makes grocery shopping more of an adventure than a chore.

Safeway General Manager Rick Edmunds doesn’t expect to lose much business to MOC. “We have a different product mix and a different shopper. We haven’t seen an effect. We’ll stick to our current product mix and pricing.”

Bales Marketplace manager Troy Wolfe says, “We will continue to focus on the fact that we are the neighborhood community grocery store, serving the community since 1961.” The store saw an initial slow-down in business right after MOC opened, but most of those customers are back after finding higher prices for the same items at the new store. Many, though, will undoubtedly add MOC to their regular stops. Some customers have urged Bales to return to it’s core strength of providing good value on a range of basic groceries, and carrying a variety of local meat, fish and produce, along with locally produced specialty items.

Adding to our list of choices is Dinihanian’s Farm Market, open most of the year with a few local food items like eggs and honey, but brimming with fresh local produce during Oregon’s growing season. They received their full organic certification last summer. They team up with other farms in the area so they can offer fruit and other produce they don’t grow on their Cornell Road farm.

Jackson’s and Plaid Pantry provide a limited selection of packaged and processed food, as does Walgreens Pharmacy. And Pars Market, a specialty grocery with a great selection of middle-eastern, and particularly Iranian foods, has been open since 2009 in the 12923 Cornell building.

Albertsons, which is owned by Cerberus Capital Management, received final permission from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on January 31 to finalize its purchase of the Safeway chain. The FTC said the sale would hurt consumers in 130 markets by reducing competition, and in December the companies said they would sell 168 stores in eight states. Most of the stores were bought by Haggen, a chain based in the Northwest.

Neither of our local stores was involved in the sale to Haggen, and will continue to exist under their current branding for the time being. (Cerberus also owns Kimco Realty, the owner of the Sunset Mall (Safeway) shopping center.)

Edmunds shared a talking-points document from the parent company that states that the new combined company will offer better values by bringing “the best of both companies to all our stores.” As to future rebranding, “Right now, we are going to run our stores as is—we don’t see any reason to make changes in the near term.”

Interestingly, Cerberus is led by Robert G. Miller. His son Mark Miller is the owner of Signature Northwest, the company that bought Bales Thriftway from Ken Findley back in 2004. Endeavour Capital is a private equity fund that has holdings in the New Seasons, BiMart and Winco chains. And you thought all these stores were local!

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