This store has an interesting history of its own. It appears that it was formerly a PriceSmart Foods, before Pattison rebranded it as Save-On sometime prior to 2009. After Save-On opened their new store, this one closed, but Pattison held onto it, and they're currently working on converting it to... a PriceSmart Foods. Yes, seriously. PriceSmart was originally a discount/warehouse chain (I'm not sure if it was a separate company that Pattison bought or a brand that they came up with to go alongside Save-On), but by the mid-2010s all but two of their stores had been converted to Save-On. At that point, Pattison completely relaunched the brand as an Asian-focused store (competing with chains like T&T), seemingly sharing nothing but the name and those two locations with the original chain, and they've since opened several new locations -- including this one with its weird history, and one right next to that other Save-On I referred to above, which was not a former Safeway but rather a former PriceSmart! It's all a bit weird and makes it feel like Pattison doesn't completely know what they're doing, a concerning thought considering their expansion into the US grocery market (and with certain political events likely meaning a dramatic reduction in competition, we're going to really need someone new like Pattison in this part of the US).
Speaking of Asian-focused stores, I'm not sure if you heard about this, but Kroger is planning on converting two Marketplace stores in Dallas into 'Asian Experiences' stores with expanded Asian product offerings. I reckon these will be Asian versions of the Hispanic-oriented Krogertsons which opened in Houston last year. That Krogertsons got a special version of Remix so I don't know what these Asian stores will get. I read in a different article that Kroger was likely doing that in Dallas in response to Tom Thumb opening a new store in the Dallas area which has an expanded selection of South Asian foods. Link: https://progressivegrocer.com/kroger-plans-2-asian-focused-concept-stores-texas
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to see a Canadian Greenhouse store of sorts! I'm not sure what the new US government will mean for the future of mergers & acquisitions. I'm guessing Lina Khan will not be retained in her current position at the FTC, but there will surely be extra public and media scrutiny of grocery mergers given current political narratives about grocery prices so it is hard to say what might happen. Given some of the trade wars between Canada and the US over things such as timber and commercial airliners over the last decade or so, perhaps even Pattison's purchases of US stores might get some scrutiny, though the whole thing with Canadian timber and airliners were mostly related to Canadian provincial government subsidization of those industries and the US, over multiple administrations, taking a negative view on such things. I don't think that should affect Pattison any as it pertains to supermarket purchases in the US.
I'll be interested to see how long those stores (both Tom Thumb and Kroger) last with their special product selection -- it seems like every time chains try to do something like that, they end up gradually going back to normal within a few years.
DeleteI don't know, I don't see a Republican administration doing anything that isn't business friendly... and Kroger has provided them with plenty of political cover through their nonsense claims that the merger will actually improve competition and prices.