Interesting to see some wholesalers converting old mall locations into clubs. More great insight into the current state of retail.
Signs of Retail Summer Slowdown: While most retailers struggle, Costco Wholesale is seeing a 52-week high, and Kroger-Albertsons Companies position themselves for a successful merger. Kroger-Albertsons wins by lowering food prices and operating nearly 4,000 strong drug stores: Kroger-Albertsons-Osco-Savon. I join Bloomberg host Nathan Hager alongside Poonam Goyal of Bloomberg Intelligence to discuss the state of retail as we head into the summer. Key Highlights mentioned below: • Strategic Resource Group analyses show the major chain drug stores’ stocks have struggled for five years -- Walgreens down 75%, RITE AID down 99.7%, CVS Health down 15%, while Walmart performs well and Kroger-Albertsons wins with nearly 4,000 pharmacies. • Internet sales are growing at 7%, outpacing the rest of retail. Consumers visit B&M stores like Walmart, Kroger, and Target for produce and meat to save money despite rising livestock, egg, and poultry prices. Some retailers' e-commerce operations create divergence, impacting foot traffic. • BJ's Wholesale Club and Costco Wholesale are converting former Macy's, Sears, and JCPenney stores into wholesale clubs, while WinCo Foods, which converts former big-box stores, offers the lowest prices in America, even lower than Walmart ~ the repurposing of retail space aims to balance from 400% over-stored a decade ago to 120-130% over-stored within five years, but this shift will lead to many “commercial casualties,” with undercapitalized chains and even some viable stores closing their brick-and-mortar locations. • Fast food menu prices, particularly McDonald's and Burger King's markup, rose to 30% over 2.5 years, leading to a transformational shift in consumer spending to eating mostly in-home meals (up to 20 times per week) from dining out for the first time in 40 years. Link: https://lnkd.in/exVZdsEi
