Albertsons has been buying up competitors for a while.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albertsons
Kroger has a few too:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kroger#Chains
They turned Pavilions from a nice store to another dingy grocery. I can’t imagine this going through would be good for consumers. Many neighborhoods only have access to 2 stores at best, and I suspect most are already owned by the same parent. A merger would further turn this into a monopoly.
FTC is a captured agency with revolving door administration between what businesses they regulate and people responsible for regulation.
You’re not wrong, but the appointment of Lina Khan to head the FTC is easily one of the only good things Biden has done while in office.
So, at least she’ll go down kicking and screaming before they finally snuff her out, metaphorically speaking.
Hopefully… Biden appointed some real pussycats to the SEC who also died shit about fuck all…
Lina Khan has been extraordinarily ineffective at the head of the FTC.
While the agency has made a lot of noise about holding big tech accountable, all they’ve managed to accomplish is losing court cases and setting even more precedent against the government’s ability to enforce anti-monopoly legislation against these companies.
Her heart seems to be in the right place, but results matter as well.
Honestly, i dislike his age, his stance on Israel and some other general things but overall I think Biden has accomplished a lot of good things as president.
Some examples:
- rejoined Paris Agreement
- rejoined WHO
- ends federal private prison contracts
- 130+ billion in student loan forgiveness
- Russia sanctions
- national registry for police fired for misconduct
- executive order protecting travel for abortion
- gas prices down (not all in his control but still)
- inflation reduction act
- Arguably the best post-pandemic economy in the world
Wait he did ALL that? I had absolutely 0 idea, it’s way more than I thought. Although I will add the one other thing I do know that he did:
- took major steps to removing medical debt from credit scores, including rolling out regulations prohibiting medical debt from being included on credit reports and creating standards for property owners to not consider medical debt for potential renters
Bad news sells. Good news goes unnoticed.
Hell I’m in Seattle and my walkable area (about 2 mile radius for me) would be reduced to this mega corp, Amazon, and a couple Asian marts. I’ve got two corner stores nearby but their produce is usually not great and mostly they have snacks and microwavables. I suspect smaller towns or less bustling neighborhoods could easily be reduced to just this super chain and nowhere else
My 2nd closest grocery store is a 40 minute drive, and it’s a Walmart.
Awesome. While we’re at it let’s sue Kroger/Smith’s for the absolute eyesore that is the hideous playmobil-lookin 3D people in their ads. The design is so bad it’s a public nuisance. Lol
That and their excessive use of Flo Rida’“Low” in their radio ads.
Having a non-nationalized monopoly is stupid and bad.
But being champions of free market economics, and then being shocked pikachu when the free market does free market things is even stupider. Especially when nothing is done to reign in this free market crap.
The US wants to be socialist so bad, but can’t get their populous to vote for it because of scary words they don’t understand. Instead it’s done as a random patchwork that of course doesn’t work and corporate lobbying just makes it appear as an illusion of choice.
Next time you’re out shopping in Walmart or Kroger or whatever look at the aisle you’re in and the choices. Let’s say cereal. 200 different choices of flavour. 50 different “brands”. In reality it’s all 1 company. There may be a couple outliers but it’s all the same company selling the same sugary processed crap giving you the illusion of choice.
Surely this merger is different from all the other ones where corporations lied their asses off then jacked up prices after the merger went through, right?
I’ve got three grocery stores near my house. One is owned by Kroger and two by Albertsons. I hate to think what would happen if there were zero effective competition.
Same situation but we have two Kroger-owned (FM and QFC) and one Albertsons-owned (Safeway). The Safeway is right across the street from Fred Meyer, so the chances are they will shut Safeway down if the merger goes through. No point in competing with themselves. So we’re looking at fewer options, lost jobs, and higher prices. Wheee.
Very rare pro-consumer W
Very rare pro-consumer W
Is it though? I fear that all this will do is allow WalMart to clobber them individually then take over their market share. A&K combined are already smaller than Wally World. (13% vs 22%). It would actually be more helpful to the grocery market if they forced Walmart to divest, what their doing with this is likely to end up with Walmart taking it all.
Why not both
I actually agree. They’re targeting the smaller fish in "big business " when they should be focusing on Walmart amazon google and the like
The FTC has always been harsher about monopolization via mergers versus business finding success independently. Not saying that’s the right way to handle things, but Walmart got to where they are through competing, not merging, with other businesses.
As a Canadian, what’s it like?
It’s like walking out of a doctor’s office without thousands of dollars in debt… I assume.
Hmmm….
Kroger: 2,750 stores in 35 states and the District of Columbia
Albertsons: 2,273 stores in 34 states
Total: 5,023 stores. Presumably some would close due to proximity after the merger.Walmart: 5,214 stores in the 50 states, DC, and Puerto Rico
I smell a break up!!!
I’d love to see it but this isn’t the best comparison. The total number of stores aren’t what makes a company a monopoly, it’s the ratio of one company’s market share versus its competitors.
Fair point.
Luckily, digging through OP’s article, I have found the data!
Together, Kroger and Albertsons would control around 13% of the U.S. grocery market; Walmart controls 22%, according to J.P. Morgan analyst Ken Goldman.
That doesn’t matter as much as what is the local grocery shopping going to be like. I’ve never been to a Kroger (and only have been to an Albertsons via the Safeways they bought), so them controlling some percent of the market doesn’t say anything about the competitiveness of my local grocery market. Lots of people only live near a single grocery store brand, and that number would increase if those two merged.
Guess Kroger and Albertsons didn’t pay enough
Two of the major chains in my area merged a while back and they were required to close down a few of their stores to prevent having a monopoly.
So of course they closed the stores that were under-performing, which just means they closed the ones in poor neighborhoods.
They still owned or kept the leases to the buildings and sub-leased them out with the stipulation that any business taking them over could not carry groceries.
Not only are the people in those areas having to drive a lot further (or spend more time on public transit), but a lot the surrounding businesses to the stores that closed down ended up going out of business themselves.
There’s at least one nearly abandoned mini-small, shopping plaza in town due to this.
If they won’t let others use it they should be compelled to sell it.
Wow never realized it but same. Clemens and Acme went under, then Superfresh. All those shopping centers are still empty or near barren and that was like well over a decade for those to go under
that seems like anti competitive behavior, I wonder if those kinds of stipulations could be made illegal. Also a commercial vacancy tax probably wouldn’t hurt.
They are legal. This is/was Walmart’s M.O. for anticompetitive behavior when one of their stores closed. Any competitors couldn’t lease, other businesses failed when they moved and didn’t have the traffic, and so you are left with both an unoccupied eye sore as well as a food / product desert…
Good idea on the vacancy and potentially changing the law to prevent anti-competitive stipulations like that.
Didn’t Albertson’s already merge with Safeway?
They did, yes
People are talking about combining the names. If Albertson’s and Safeway didn’t, I suspect it will be the same with Kroger.
Safe Albert. Name writes itself. Gives people false sense of security even.
Safeson? Albertsway?
Best to keep the names separate to create the illusion of choice.
This has been silently happening in every industry for years.
The Luxottica approach.
Started shopping for sunglasses about a week ago and learned about Luxottica. Turns out there’s a grand total of three brands of sunglasses that are viable for me to buy. Made in the USA but still only cost the same $300 that made in china Oakleys and ray bans cost.
I just ordered a pair of 20 dollar polarized sunglassess off amazon. Fuck the name brands and the ridiculous prices.
I’d still rather support American jobs and the American economy. I’m willing to pay for that and the quality is usually worth it IMO. If I can give my money to company that hasn’t outsourced jobs, I will.
I’m actually in Canada but there’s only two sunglasses manufacturers here and they’re both over priced high fashion stuff.
Yep! This reminds me of the infographic where almost every major food brand in the world is covered by 10 parent brands. https://www.good.is/Business/food-brands-owners-rp
Illusion of choice
Kroger and Albertsons are the two major chains in my city (known as Fry’s and Safeway here). If they merge, their only real competition left is Walmart.
That said, I wouldn’t be surprised if they haven’t secretly merged decades ago already. Their products, prices, and branding are nearly identical. Even the commercials they play over the store speakers are the same.
Does anyone get hanged when it reaches half a billion?
Capitalism, where a couple of fucking dudes can make or break a whole country.
And where being poorly suited for wielding that kind of power responsibly makes you more likely to be one of those fucking dudes.
FML, I hate that this is actually the case. God damn it.
So rare.
Prices are already outrageous. We don’t need more of that.
I hope the lawsuit is successful. This would make them the only viable store in many areas.
What if the only viable store would give you better deals than 2 competing ones?
Why would that ever even happen? What incentive does a business have to stifle its own profit margins?
If it was owned by the public, then the people could do the best they can with what they have instead of the least people are willing to accept while charging the most they’re willing to pay.
It’s why all the useful idiots are against nationalization of corporations. It removes private owners who exist just to siphon profits.
It’s interesting living in a partof the USA where I couldn’t even tell you where a Kroger or Albertsons is. Maybe they don’t tend to overlap with Food Lion’s?
Iirc they own many subbrands that cover most of the country. Here is a list:
