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Been hearing about the HT - Publix relationship for years. Now that we have a Pubix (right across the street from HT) a MAJOR differentiator has emerged.
HT takes food out of cart, registers it, bags it and puts in cart.
At Publix, you have to take food out of cart, put on belt, it gets registered and bagged, then put back in cart.
May seem like a non event .. until you get 8 six packs of soda, big 24 pack of water, and big bags of dog and cat food, and a bag of charcoal. That was a lot of lifting for someone spoiled at HT.
Been hearing about the HT - Publix relationship for years. Now that we have a Pubix (right across the street from HT) a MAJOR differentiator has emerged.
HT takes food out of cart, registers it, bags it and puts in cart.
At Publix, you have to take food out of cart, put on belt, it gets registered and bagged, then put back in cart.
May seem like a non event .. until you get 8 six packs of soda, big 24 pack of water, and big bags of dog and cat food, and a bag of charcoal. That was a lot of lifting for someone spoiled at HT.
It is also terribly inefficient!
Wait, Publix doesn't have hand scanners at the register to process Bottom of cart Items?
Whenever I end up at Publix, I use the self checkout.
I have not seen a Publix yet with handheld scanners.
Harris Teeter and Ingle's, which had a combination of cart-scanner-belt-bag or cart-scanner-bag, are moving to cart-belt-scanner-belt-bag in some stores.
I have not seen a Publix yet with handheld scanners.
Harris Teeter and Ingle's, which had a combination of cart-scanner-belt-bag or cart-scanner-bag, are moving to cart-belt-scanner-belt-bag in some stores.
That ain't good.
Carolina Knight: You seem really dialed in on Grocery stores? Without divulging too much, are you in the biz?
I think Lowes is an attractive buyout target. I wonder if Wegmans will go to the Triad next, or just leap all the way to Charlotte.
The Charlotte market would be a logical next step in NC after Raleigh, although they could always infill in Greensboro. But a Charlotte expansion is the next big question after the Triangle. There are many transplanted New Yorkers and and former residents of DC, Maryland and Virginia now in the Charlotte area such that a Wegmans would indeed be welcome.
If Lowe's Foods were to go, I could see the stores go to Albertsons or Publix. Kroger wouldn't buy them (too much overlap with HT, and their expansion prospects are quite limited), Walmart doesn't buy Grocery store chains, and Bi-Lo's parent company needs to think about their Winn-Dixie stores before attempting to buy another chain.
In Virginia, Martin's suffered. SuperValu will continue to suffer.
The newer Lowe's Foods are apparently quite upscale and very nice. But are they enough of a gamechanger to effectively compete against Publix and Harris Teeter? They previously decided the answer was no, and pulled out of most of the Charlotte market. But ironically they are now preparing to enter Greenville, SC where they will eventually face the same competition with the return of Harris Teeter. And many of the Charlotte Lowe's stores were already sold to Harris Teeter. The future of Lowe's Food indeed remains a bit curious.
It will be interesting to see how Lowe's Foods would survive all of this. They seem to be going for the HT/Publix crowd and those are two vehement competitors.It's interesting seeing them make announcements for new stores in the Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston metropolitan areas in SC.
From what I've read, some of the Retail analysts don't seem that impressed by it. IMO, it's nicer than it looked before (Lowe's Foods was very bland), but it's still definitely not my first choice.
I think Lowe's Foods would be better if it lowered its price point, got rid of some of the theatrics, and all of those godawful puns. There's plenty of Locally owned chains that don't make a gimmick out of the fact that they are locally owned.
I wouldn't say excel, but they have a pretty good reputation for their prepared foods.
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