Quote:
Originally Posted by Biff
There will be a Wal-Mart Supercenter in the new Shindico development off Taylor. The former Grant Park Safeway will have to be something else.
|
The expansion plans into Canada for Whole Foods suggest Manitoba, and more likely Winnipeg, would see serveral of their stores open here. The Grant Park Mall and St Vital Mall are both fairly high traffic locations in or near more affluent areas of Winnipeg. Further, it seems counter-intuitive that Sobey's will continue to operate two distribution warehouses in Winnipeg even though the Competition Bureau said they could.
I think the outcome of the Safeway sale to Sobey's will see the St Vital, Southdale and Grant Park stores convert to the Whole Foods banner along with the Safeway distribution centre on Route 90. The Safeway milk processing operations though may go either way.
Further, the list of locations to be divested (sold or closed) is the
minimum for the deal to be completed. It is hard to imagine that both the Sobey's and Safeway on Lag near Regent and both stores in the Unicity area will continue to operate long term. I am sure there are other locations I have not identified that are being considered for sale/closure.
As for the Main at Luxton store, that ones seems to tie in with the rumor that Loblaws kept the property for their closed Extra Foods store next door. Could a deal be in the works for a larger, newly constructed, Loblaws branded store to open on a combination of those sites? Alternatively, might the local residents that banded together to form a coop to save Pollock Hardware take on the challenge of running a grocery store coop on the Safeway site?
Yes, the brands at these locations have reached the end of life but that does not mean to end of grocery sales at these sites yet.