By Richard Juarez
Like Ralphs and Vons, Albertsons is continuing the trend of moving out of inner-city areas. Change that to ethnic communities. The Ralphs and Albertsons in downtown San Diego are doing just fine because their target shoppers are their predominantly white middle class neighbors. They are leaving City Heights, National City and Chula Vista because they have lost sales to smaller specialty markets that cater to their clients’ food preferences.
The large traditional supermarkets are set up to provide the same food products in all their stores, all over the country. Their store policies do not allow individual stores to adjust their products to meet the food preferences of the neighborhood clientele. They cannot or will not adjust because they want to be able to order the same food, have the same promotions and sales at all stores, and more easily compare store performance using the same products. [Read more…]