New Orleans area supermarkets

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pseudo3d
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by pseudo3d »

The Albertsons stores actually replaced some Delchamps stores? Wow. Just wow, considering that many of the Delchamps stores were small and out of date. Was the store at 14500 Plank Road a Delchamps originally?

It's weird things like this that make me wonder how ill-conceived the Houston division was to begin with. The total market saturation, locations thrown everywhere without regard to competing with their own stores or demographics, and more.
wnetmacman
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:Was the store at 14500 Plank Road a Delchamps originally?
Only two stores that I know of were Delchamps; the store in Mandeville, which was, in this order: Delchamps, Albertsons, Sav-A-Center, Albertsons, and now is being broken up for other uses; and a store in Marrero on Lapalco, which was originally a Woolco. The Lapalco store was remodeled to a true Delchamps, while the Mandeville store was a newer, post Jitney merger build, one of two in Louisiana.

14500 Plank Road was actually originally a Kmart.
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pseudo3d
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by pseudo3d »

The Mandeville store was a Delchamps Premier...I knew that...I was imagining one of the smaller, older Delchamps.

As for the post-Albertsons II Mandeville, I thought I read that they had confirmed Whole Foods in the space after rumors, and that Albertsons closed due to high rents.
wnetmacman
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by wnetmacman »

pseudo3d wrote:The Mandeville store was a Delchamps Premier...I knew that...I was imagining one of the smaller, older Delchamps.
To put this in perspective, Delchamps built three distinctive stores prior to the Jitney Jungle merger. The smallest store had a flat front (doors even with the front walls). Those stores were built in the mid to late 70's, and were about 28,000 sq. ft.. The second generation had a half vestibule (the main front wall ran about 2/3 of the left side, with windows halfway across. The far left side was indented and the doors were on the side of the indention. These were referred to as Super Stores. The third was referred to as Super Market, and had dual entrances with a center service desk between them. These were around 40-50,000 sq. ft, and included renovated Super Stores. The Lapalco store was the last of these.

The Premier stores were a Jitney invention, and were intended to be what saved the company. They massively failed.
pseudo3d wrote:As for the post-Albertsons II Mandeville, I thought I read that they had confirmed Whole Foods in the space after rumors, and that Albertsons closed due to high rents.
Whole Foods is taking up 40,000 sq. ft. of the space. The rent issue isn't confirmed. The store was surrounded by two Rouses, a nice Winn Dixie and a Walmart Neighborhood Market. It didn't stand a chance when it reopened.
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pseudo3d
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by pseudo3d »

The rent issue was never mentioned in the papers, but the fact that they rumored a Whole Foods Market BEFORE Albertsons pulled out suggests that it was the case. After all, I believe that the Clifton Acme did close with high rents, even though it was a modestly popular, clean, up to date store that could've held its own against the competition.

Admittedly I don't know much about the Mandeville Albertsons, but the Google Maps image showed the parking lot as mostly full (rare for Albertsons in that division) and the fact that WFM picked it up so quickly strongly suggests that it wasn't as crushed by competition as you make it to be, which is why I'm going with the "high rents" theory.
wnetmacman
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by wnetmacman »

wnetmacman wrote:Admittedly I don't know much about the Mandeville Albertsons, but the Google Maps image showed the parking lot as mostly full (rare for Albertsons in that division) and the fact that WFM picked it up so quickly strongly suggests that it wasn't as crushed by competition as you make it to be, which is why I'm going with the "high rents" theory.
You have to keep in mind that this was Albertsons' second try with this store. They bought it at the Delchamps failure in 2000. By 2003, when Albertsons left New Orleans, this store (and another Albertsons-built one in Covington a few miles north on US190) were specifically selected to sell to A&P. When A&P left in 2007, the store sat abandoned for some time until Albertsons came back in approximately 2012.

Mandeville is a very high-end community. They have been begging WFM to come for some time. Premier Marketplace (the shopping center) is owned by Stirling Properties. They were the ones who announced this change, most likely due to the knowledge that the community would rather have WFM than Albertsons.

Another thing, as I mentioned before, is that the area is overrun with more locally themed supermarkets: within 5 miles are 4 Rouses, 4 Winn Dixies (including the Louisiana division flagship), 3 Walmarts (2 Neighborhood Markets and a Supercenter) and a host of other stores. One Albertsons would have to really work to be profitable.

WFM is only taking 40,000sf of the building; another 20,000sf will be open for another tenant. 40,000sf is large for WFM; the Lafayette store that was built last year is only 25,000.
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pseudo3d
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by pseudo3d »

wnetmacman wrote:
wnetmacman wrote:Admittedly I don't know much about the Mandeville Albertsons, but the Google Maps image showed the parking lot as mostly full (rare for Albertsons in that division) and the fact that WFM picked it up so quickly strongly suggests that it wasn't as crushed by competition as you make it to be, which is why I'm going with the "high rents" theory.
You have to keep in mind that this was Albertsons' second try with this store. They bought it at the Delchamps failure in 2000. By 2003, when Albertsons left New Orleans, this store (and another Albertsons-built one in Covington a few miles north on US190) were specifically selected to sell to A&P. When A&P left in 2007, the store sat abandoned for some time until Albertsons came back in approximately 2012.

Mandeville is a very high-end community. They have been begging WFM to come for some time. Premier Marketplace (the shopping center) is owned by Stirling Properties. They were the ones who announced this change, most likely due to the knowledge that the community would rather have WFM than Albertsons.

Another thing, as I mentioned before, is that the area is overrun with more locally themed supermarkets: within 5 miles are 4 Rouses, 4 Winn Dixies (including the Louisiana division flagship), 3 Walmarts (2 Neighborhood Markets and a Supercenter) and a host of other stores. One Albertsons would have to really work to be profitable.

WFM is only taking 40,000sf of the building; another 20,000sf will be open for another tenant. 40,000sf is large for WFM; the Lafayette store that was built last year is only 25,000.
Albertsons in Mandeville opened in 2009, not 2012, which is three more years to the store's lifetime and was a little less than 6 years, which was more than their first try lasted (about 4, before being sold to Sav-a-Center). The store was probably profitable, but if it was Stirling Properties announcing the change, it was probably either high rent or they bought out their lease, not a failure on Albertsons part (for once)
wnetmacman
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by wnetmacman »

High rent alone wouldn't be enough to close the store down; a long term lease would still have to be paid. (Closed store leases were a huge contributor to Winn-Dixie's bankruptcy; it allowed them out of pretty much all of them) Stirling offered a deal to get WFM in place.
Scott Greer
pseudo3d
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by pseudo3d »

Admittedly, I never went to the Mandeville store in either of its Albertsons incarnations, but the question is how exactly popular (or lack thereof) was it before Stirling gave them an offer. The parking lot for the whole shopping center did appear to be packed (in Holcombe of Hidalgo's pics), and it was a beautiful store, had a Community Coffee inside, and had survived for at least 5 years, which is sadly a lot more than what could be said about many of the Albertsons in that part of the world (and in those 5 years, I'm sure it was profitable, unlike others in the old Houston division).
wnetmacman
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by wnetmacman »

Not all of the Albertsons stores in Louisiana do poorly. Shreveport and Lafayette each have a store that is 30+ years old. The Lafayette store was one of the most profitable in the entire chain owing to its location (right off the parade route, and just down from the University of Louisiana). Only one store has closed in Lafayette, and it should never have opened.

True, nothing east of the Mississippi has been their high sales leaders, but in Baton Rouge, several of the stores remaining do well.

Houston proper and New Orleans proper were a bust due to overexpansion too quickly in markets they weren't familiar with. One of the best things for them was to merge with Safeway so they could get a little more local expertise.
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Re: New Orleans area supermarkets

Post by BillyGr »

wnetmacman wrote:High rent alone wouldn't be enough to close the store down; a long term lease would still have to be paid. (Closed store leases were a huge contributor to Winn-Dixie's bankruptcy; it allowed them out of pretty much all of them) Stirling offered a deal to get WFM in place.
That would make sense, the current tenant not wanting the spot due to cost, but knowing that the property owner wants to use the space for something else, so gets them to drop the remainder of the lease in return for moving out to allow the something else to come in.
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