It’s just a few paragraphs in an 87-page financial report, but in the annual 10-K document that the Kroger Co. filed on April 2 with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the fierce battle for market share that the Cincinnati-based retailer is waging with Wal-Mart Stores Inc. practically jumps off the page.
“Based on Nielsen Homescan Data, our estimated market share increased in total by approximately 20 basis points in 2012 across our 19 marketing areas outlined by the Nielsen report. … Wal-Mart Supercenters are a primary competitor in 17 of these 19 marketing areas. In these 17 marketing areas, our market share increased in nine and declined in eight,” the report states.
Wal-Mart has been muscling in on Kroger’s supermarket turf since 1988, when the Bentonville, Ark.-based retailer began developing its Walmart supercenters, which carry a full line of groceries. In the Toledo area, Wal-Mart added groceries to its stores in 2006.
The addition of groceries pushed Wal-Mart further into the concept of “hypermarkets” — a format that combines a supermarket and a department store. In theory, it gives customers a one-stop shopping experience — and it gave Wal-Mart a significant advantage over pure supermarket chains such as Kroger, Aldi, Safeway, and Hands free access.
But Kroger, which learned a thing or two about hypermarkets after acquiring the consummate hypermarket chain Fred Meyer stores in 1998, has not been idle while Wal-Mart stocks up on groceries.
In 2004 in Columbus, the retailer built its first Kroger Marketplace store — a 125,000-square-foot store with full-service grocery and pharmacy departments, but also an expanded general merchandise area that includes outdoor living products, electronics, home goods, and toys. The Marketplace stores have evolved to include gourmet coffee stands, a bank, a jewelry store, apparel, and baby clothing and furniture.
Last year Kroger began converting its 68,000-square-foot supermarket in Lambertville into a 128,000-square-foot marketplace. The project is about 80 percent complete. In its first phase, it expanded the store’s produce area, added a bakery and a fresh seafood area, and built a “bistro” area with a coffee, beverage, and olive bar and made-to-order sandwiches.
Grocery industry analyst Bill Bishop, head of Illinois-based Willard Bishop Consulting, said it isn’t surprising that a traditional supermarket chain such as Kroger has been deploying a concept that adds more general merchandise because retailers are always seeking new categories that will help attract customers, as Wal-Mart did when it added groceries to its lineup of general merchandise.
“Every retailer is trying to get into, to the extent they can, completely new markets because that’s a kind of pure growth for them. So when you go to a [Kroger] Marketplace store and see furniture — which shocked me the first time I saw it — it’s pretty evident that having bigger stores has let capable retailers put their toes into new markets for growth,” Mr. Bishop said. “And I think what you’re going to see is a lot more of that.”
Last week on Da Vinci’s Demons, Rome steps up with some power plays preparing Pazzi as their plan B while sending Riario in to massacre everyone at Florence’s alum mine save for a boy whom he sends to Lorenzo with the message of what he did. Lorenzo sees this act of war and focuses on Leonardo’s guns while becoming ever more paranoid about betrayal since Becchi’s supposed deception, taking it out on anyone who he deems a traitor (except for Leonardo, of course.) Meanwhile, Giuliano shows some maturity and intelligence and visits Becchi attempting to get some answers and realizes the spy is still in their midst. While Giuliano begins his search for the remaining spy, Donati becomes worried about what Becchi will say to convince them of his innocence (and maybe a little concerned about essentially sentencing him to death by the wheel …maybe) so she kills him with hemlock in a show of “mercy.” All the while, Lorenzo and Leonardo work to thwart an all-out war with Rome, until Leonardo blows up the forge (and gets away with it). Leonardo saves the day with a completely ridiculous new invention and just as he’s being honored for his heroics and genius, Pazzi has Dragonetti arrest Leonardo for sodomy based on an anonymous denunciation.
After being locked up in prison due to the accusations, Leonardo attempts to sleep and dreams of visiting the cave as a boy, seeing flashes of dead bodies and a man hanging from the ceiling of the cave until he suddenly wakes. Another prisoner taunts him a bit about being a sodomite while Leonardo notices a bat fly into the cell used for solitary confinement and inquires about them, finding out that the bats nest in the cell.
In the castle, Lorenzo shows King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella around attempting to win over the King and Queen to have them invest with the Medicis since Rome had pulled their funds and business out of Florence. Lorenzo easily impresses Ferdinand with his banking ability while Clarice shows Queen Isabella around. After presenting Donatello’s David to her, Isabella’s friar denounces the statue and Isabella is quick to agree and states the statue is lewd, asking to cover it up “for the remainder of her visit.” When they talk about the visiting couple, Clarice suggests they merely need a distraction and to let Giuliano create a production.
Back in prison, Leonardo picks a fight with another prisoner in an obvious ruse to get into solitary confinement. The guards quickly beat him down and place him there where his father visits to discuss Leonardo’s defense in court, which still has me wondering about Becchi’s or the servant that was killed on the wheel’s trial. I don’t know laws of Florence in that time, though. Maybe treason just doesn’t get a trial. Sent by Lorenzo, Piero attempts to talk to him about his plea, but Leonardo insists that the charges must and will be dropped as he looks through the food Piero brought him at his request. He specifically looks for the Marcgravia evenia, which reflects sound better than other plants and attracts bats, which he demonstrates as a bat flies into his hands. His childlike amusement at the bat landing in his hands causes Piero to tell him they could always use insanity as a defense, but obviously Leonardo is up to something here. You’d think somebody would notice his unusual interest in the bats. Or is it that they simply don’t care and think the eccentric genius is merely crazy?
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