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The Griffin Report of Food Marketing • JUNE 2014
Stop & Shop Celebrates 100 Years More Coverage @ thegriffinreport.com
The History of Stop & Shop...
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Marc Smith served as president and chief executive officer of Stop & Shop from September 2000 to 2006.
Stop & Shop opened a low energy Super Store in Foxboro, Mass.
José Alvarez was president and chief executive officer of Stop & Shop/Giant-Landover from April 2006 through July 2008.
Carl Schlicker served as president and chief executive officer of both Stop & Shop and Giant Landover from 2008 to 2009 before being promoted to run Ahold USA.
company announced plans to sell its Charles B. Perkins and Medi Mart divisions. A similar strategy was implemented in early 1987 when company officials announced plans to divest Almy’s Department Stores. Two years later, the company would face difficult times. In 1988, responding to a hostile takeover by Herbert Haft, the company went private with the help of Kohlberg, Kravitz and Roberts. As a result, both of the Goldbergs left the company, ending 70 years of family management of Stop & Shop. The next year Lewis Schaeneman Jr. was named chairman of the board. The 1990s saw many changes and much growth for Stop & Shop. By 1991, the retailer was able to go public again, selling 41 percent of the company for $212.5 million. The next year, the company sold its Bradlees stores, ending its foray into the department store business. In 1993, Bob Tobin was named president of Stop & Shop, adding the CEO title in 1994 and the chairmanship in 1995 when Mr. Schaeneman retired. In 1995, the company was operating 100 super stores and it was ready to embark on an era of rapid expansion. That year, the company acquired Melmarkets which operated 17 Foodtown units on Long Island, giving Stop & Shop its first foothold in the New York region. That same year the retailer acquired Purity Supreme which operated 38 stores in the N. Billerica, Mass., market. And the company acquired 28 Mayfair supermarkets in northern and central New Jersey. The next year, long-time Stop & Shop employee Bill Grize was named president of the company; he added the CEO title in 1997, and Mr. Tobin remained with the company as its chairman.
In 1996, Royal Ahold NV acquired Stop & Shop for $2.9 billion. Previously, Ahold acquired Giant Food Stores of Carlisle, Pa., and Finast Supermarkets of Ohio, Connecticut, New York and Massachusetts. The next year, the Netherlands-based international retailer acquired GiantLandover’s 173 stores in the Baltimore-Washington market and in 2000 the Edwards chain. As the 1990s closed, the company was again making strides in adding new technology to its shopping experience. In 1999, Stop & Shop became the first supermarket company to offer in-store scanning technology to its customers. That year, customers could use the company’s Personal Shopping Assistant. In 2003, the company’s Shopping Buddy program was launched, and the next year as more advances were made to the technology, the company switched to EasyShop. Further improvement led the next year to SCAN IT technology. Today shoppers have the option of using their mobile phones to shop with Mobile SCAN IT! As the new century dawned in 2000, Bill Grize became the CEO of Ahold USA and Marc Smith was named to head Stop & Shop. The company continued to invest in the future by acquiring a 51 percent stake in Peapod and acquired the remaining shares of the home delivery company in 2001. In 2007, Peapod reached a major milestone, fulfilling its 10 millionth online order. The company continues to invest in home delivery today and continues to roll out Pick-up Points, which are drive-up facilities for customers to use Peapod’s online ordering. In yet another first, Stop & Shop opened its first low energy superstore in Foxboro, Mass., in 2002. The company remains dedicated to supporting the environment as part of its ini-
tiative to be a better neighbor to the communities it serves. In 2013, Stop & Shop, along with the other Ahold USA retail divisions, had six stores receive Leadership In Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operations of high performance green buildings. This represents the largest fleet of LEED-certified stores among grocery retailers in the U.S. The company remains dedicated to making its existing stores energy efficient and to date, Ahold USA has 56 stores that have achieved LEED certifications for existing buildings The first decade of the 2000s saw Stop & Shop experiment with the co-branded storewithin-a-store concept and debuted a new prototype featuring Dunkin’ Donuts, Office Max, Toys R Us, Boston Market and a portrait studio in 2003. In 2005, the retailer teamed up with officer supply retailer Staples and in 2006, Stop & Shop announced a five-year agreement with Starbucks. In 2004, Stop & Shop opened a new state-of-the-art 1.2 million-square-foot distribution and transportation facility in Freetown, Mass. Later that year, Ahold USA integrated the Stop & Shop and GiantLandover operations into one organization based in Quincy, Mass. Later that year, Bill Grize retired as Ahold USA president and chief executive officer. Recognizing that an opportunity for growth existed in the booming natural and organic segment, Stop & Shop and GiantLandover introduced the Nature’s Promise line in 2004. Natural organic sales were projected to reach the $16 billion mark by the end of the year. Finding success with its own brands, two years later, the division launched the (Continues on page S&S-20)