C&S Wholesale To Supply Winn-Dixie Stores

BI-LO Holding, parent company of BI-LO and Winn-Dixie grocery stores, and C&S Wholesale Grocers agreed to a supply pact where C&S will provide warehouse, transportation and most procurement services for all 480 Winn-Dixie stores and continue providing services to all 206 BI-LO stores.

"We believe this deal will allow us to leverage the experience and buying power of C&S so that we can continue to reinvest in our company and focus on selling great products at a good value to our customers," said Randall Onstead, president and chief executive officer of Jacksonville, Fla.-based BI-LO Holding.

By the end of the year, Winn-Dixie's six distribution centers—located in Baldwin, Jacksonville, Miami and Orlando, Fla., Montgomery, Ala., and Hammond, La. and the functions that support them, will be transitioned. C&S intends to operate the facilities as they are today, with minimal change to existing associates or their wages and benefits. As each distribution center is transitioned over to C&S, associates of the distribution centers will become employees of C&S.

C&S has provided procurement, warehouse and transportation services for BI-LO LLC since 2005. The new agreement covers both the BI-LO and Winn-Dixie banners across the company wide network of nearly 700 stores.

Food Lion Plans To Invest In 178 Stores In Five States

Food Lion announced last week that it has made significant investments in 178 stores in five states, including Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia and also created 800 new jobs. Food Lion also announced it lowered prices on 6,000 items throughout the store including the company's my essentials products.  The company also improved its produce offerings as part of its "Fresh From the Field" initiative.

To celebrate the launch, Food Lion held grand re-opening festivities at the 178 stores, including providing the first 50 customers at each location a bag of free groceries through Saturday, May 18.  

The company also plans to kick off a week of giving by donating fresh produce and store brand products to local charities, including $5,000 to the Maryland Food Bank in Baltimore, Md.; $5,000 to the Delaware Food Bank in Milford, Del.; $5,000 to the Fredericksburg Food Bank in Fredericksburg, Va.; and $5,000 to the Capital Area Food Bank in Washington, D.C.  In addition, Food Lion will continue working with these food banks in its ongoing efforts to fight food insecurity and relieve hunger in area communities.  By the end of 2013, Food Lion is on track to donate more than 245,000 pounds of food in these markets.

PriceRite To Open In Danbury, Conn.

PriceRite's newest location in Connecticut is scheduled to open Wednesday, May 22 in Danbury, Located at 29 Main Street, this store marks the eleventh PriceRite location in Connecticut and will bring 130 full and part-time jobs to the Danbury community.

The 45,000 square foot, state-of-the-art PriceRite of Danbury will feature some of the industry’s leading "green technologies," including glass doors on dairy cases, and energy-efficient lighting and refrigeration throughout the store. To further reduce costs and pass along those savings to customers, PriceRite does not advertise or publish a weekly circular. Customers are encouraged to use their own bags or to buy them as needed for 10 cents each.

PriceRite stores are a wholly-owned subsidiary of Wakefern Food Corp., headquartered in Elizabeth, NJ.  PriceRite operates stores in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Maryland.  PriceRite stores offer customers an expanded produce department and food products at saving up to 50 percent less than traditional supermarkets.  The typical PriceRite store is about 30,000 to 40,000 square feet in size and employs anywhere from 50 to 150 associates.

Latest Word in New Channels...

• The annual Mass. Food Assn. Convention gets underway this coming weekend beginning Friday, May 24 at the Omni Mount Washington Resort in New Hampshire. Ed and Rick Roche will be presented with the Milton Segal Distinguished Service Award This year's convention theme is “MFA’s Medieval Magic and will revolve around the category focus of beer, wine, and cheese.

• Associated Grocers of New England has appointed Joe Finnigan as retail pricing manager He succeeds Allan Hulse who was recently promoted to vice president of wholesale merchandising and procurement.

• Advantage Waypoint, a division of Advantage Sales & Marketing, has acquired Food Scene Inc. and Deli Scene Inc.  and will support Advantage Waypoint’s commitment to the Deli and In-Store Bakery channels.  These acquisitions increase Advantage Waypoints coverage of New York, Long Island, Western Pa, and Philadelphia.