Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's California WIC Voucher Expansion Program Stalled

Related story - December 15, 2010: A Tale of Two California's: Welcome to the Once Thriving Central Valley.

In July of this year we reported that after much delay, Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market finally began accepting WIC Vouchers at one of its 106 stores in California, the unit at 1025 East Adams Boulevard (Central & Adams) in low-income South Los Angeles. There are 155 Fresh & Easy stores. In addition to the 106 California markets, there are 28 units in Arizona and 21 stores in Nevada.

In our story about the development - July 30, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Store at Central & Adams in South Los Angeles is Now Accepting WIC Vouchers; Additional Stores to Follow - we reported that following the test at the Central & Adams store in South Los Angeles, which opened in February 2010, Fresh & Easy planned to roll out the acceptance of the vouchers, which are provided by the state to low-income mothers so they can purchase specific nutritious foods like whole milk, infant formula, whole grain cereals and breads, and fresh produce, for their children, to selected other stores in California.

At the time, Fresh & Easy was looking to expand its acceptance of the WIC Vouchers to additional stores by at least the early fall, according to our sources.

However, nearly five months later, the grocer has yet to begin accepting the vouchers at any additional Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market stores in the Golden State, according to our research.

Not long after it began taking the WIC Vouchers at the south Los Angeles market in July, Fresh & Easy sent out a memo, which included a "WIC cabinet/shelf schematic," to store managers at various stores in Southern California and in the Central Valley (Bakersfield and Fresno regions), alerting them that an expansion to other stores would be coming in the near future. But five months later, and with 2010 coming to an end, the roll out has been long-stalled.

We've recently talked to a number of store managers and team leaders at Fresh & Easy markets in Southern California and in the Central Valley, particularly those in low-income neighborhoods, who tell us they aren't sure if or when the acceptance of WIC Vouchers will be rolled out to additional stores, despite being under the impression since this summer that such a roll out was coming well before the end of the year.

One Fresh & Easy management employee in the Central Valley tells us that at least three of the seven stores in the Bakersfield region could see a 10%-15% sales boost simply if WIC Vouchers were accepted at the markets. The employee also told us the other four stores should see an at least 5%-10% increase from WIC because WIC Voucher use is up so much since the recession hit the area hard in 2007-2008.

The Fresh & Easy worker sited a Save Mart-owned Food Maxx discount grocery store and a Safeway-owned Vons supermarket, both located near a Fresh & Easy unit in Bakersfield, that generate tens of thousands of dollars a week in sales from customers using the WIC Vouchers to purchase high-ticket items like infant formula, whole grain breads and cereals, and gallons of whole milk.

A store-level manager in the Fresno area told us a similar story, saying WIC Voucher and food stamp use has grown so much in the Central Valley region over the last few years because of the high joblessness and growing poverty rate that the particular store turns away customers regularly who attempt to purchase WIC-approved items like whole milk, produce, cereals, eggs and other items but are unaware the Fresh & Easy stores don't except the vouchers.

The manager, who has extensive grocery retailing experience in the region, said all seven of the Fresno-area Fresh & Easy stores would see sales growth if they could accept the vouchers, with at least three of the stores likely gaining double-digit sales increases if the WIC acceptance to expanded to the area.

The Central Valley has the highest joblessness rates in California, ranging from 14% unemployment in the best counties to 20% in the worse areas. California's unemployment rate is currently 12.4%.

The region's poverty rate is also among the highest and fastest-growing in the nation. Many experts have taken to calling the Central Valley "America's new Appalachia," for example, because of its high and growing poverty rate.

Unlike food stamps, which today are called SNAP and come loaded on a plastic debit card so grocery stores can handle the transfer of payments electronically at the point-of-sale, WIC Vouchers are paper, similar to a check. Grocers must process the vouchers in the same way they do paper checks.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has self-service checkout and doesn't accept paper checks in the stores. Therefore, its point-of-sales systems aren't set-up to process the paper vouchers - along with paper checks or manufacturers' cents-off coupons.

In order to process the WIC Vouchers at the south Los Angeles store, Fresh & Easy had to make modifications to the store's point-of-sale system. Additionally, store clerks must assist each customer who pays for their purchases using the vouchers.

Based on our reporting, it appears two factors are primarily behind Fresh & Easy's having not rolled out the acceptance of the WIC Vouchers to additional California stores, despite the fact its plans, at least this summer, were to do so.

First, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has had numerous problems with the adapted point-of-sale system at the Third & Adams store in south Los Angeles, in terms of processing the paper WIC Vouchers.

In addition, the grocer doesn't want to establish a full-service checkout lane in each of its stores, which it might have to do if it accepted the vouchers in all 106 of its California stores. Doing so would add to overall store labor expenses. (In our experience and analysis, the added sales from WIC would more than make up for any such added labor costs though.)

Meanwhile, store managers and clerks at numerous Fresh & Easy markets in California, particularly those in low-income neighborhoods in Los Angeles and other parts of Southern California, as well as in the Central Valley, wonder what's taking so long in terms of expanding the acceptance of the WIC Vouchers to additional stores in California?

It seems like a good question for them to ask, since as they've told us, Fresh & Easy store workers are regularly sending shoppers who come in the stores wanting to use WIC Vouchers - as well as customers who use food stamps and cash to shop at the stores but also get WIC Vouchers but can't use them when they shop at Fresh & Easy - down the street to a Vons, Ralphs, Stater Bros., Albertsons, Walmart, Save Mart or other competitor's store - virtually every chain and independent of note in California accepts WIC Vouchers - and losing needed sales in their stores.

[Editor's Note: Three years ago, Fresh & Easy Buzz first pointed out and reported on the fact that Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, which opened its first stores in November 2007, didn't accept WIC Vouchers. Additionally, in analysis and commentary pieces beginning in 2008 - and right up until the grocer decided to accept the vouchers at its first store, the Central and Adams unit in South Los Angeles on July 29 - we've also pointed out in detail how, from both business (added sales) and ethical grocer perspectives, Fresh & Easy was missing the boat by not accepting WIC in its stores. All this time later, the grocer continues to miss that same boat by failing to roll out the acceptance of WIC to additional stores in California.

Below is a selection of some of those past stories from Fresh & Easy Buzz:

July 30, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Store at Central & Adams in South Los Angeles is Now Accepting WIC Vouchers; Additional Stores to Follow

July 28, 2010: What A Long, Strange Trip it's Been: South Los Angeles Will Be First Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Store to Accept WIC Vouchers Starting Tomorrow

July 7, 2010: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Start Accepting WIC Vouchers at Central & Adams Store in South Los Angeles This Month

September 7, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Should Tesco's Fresh & Easy Put An Asterisk Next to its Motto? Yes; Unless it Corrects Four Operational Omissions

December 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy, 'Food Deserts' and WIC Vouchers; A 'Year-End' Analysis & Commentary

February 10, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Opens Latest New Store in 'Food Desert' City of Compton, California

July 2008: Tesco's to Open A Fresh & Easy Grocery Market in Low Income, Underserved South Central Los Angeles Neighborhood

March 7, 2009: Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track

July 11, 2008: 'Food Desert' Neighborhoods and Southern California: More on the Fresh & Easy Store Planned For South Central Los Angeles

July 15, 2008: Fresh Food to Bloom in An Inner-City Food Desert: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Breaks Ground For New Store in Underserved South Los Angeles Neighborhood

February 23, 2010: Food Deserts & WIC Vouchers: Half A Loaf For the New Fresh & Easy Store Opening Tomorrow in South Los Angeles

February 24, 2010: Fresh & Easy Store Opens its Doors in South Los Angeles

April 22, 2010: Breaking Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Accept WIC Vouchers at its East Adams Store in South Los Angeles

May 14, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Not Yet Accepting WIC Vouchers at South L.A. Store; No Start Date Set

July 6, 2008: Former NBA Great Earvin 'Magic' Johnson is Working His Business Magic in Urban, Inner City Neighborhoods; We Offer An Idea For Tesco's Fresh & Easy

May 12, 2008: Food Deserts: Coalition to Create 'Blue Ribbon' Commission, Draft Report to Encourage Grocers to Open Stores in Underserved Los Angeles Neighborhoods

February 13, 2008: Leading Democratic Candidate for President Barack Obama Joins Group in Asking Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Put More Stores in Underserved Neighborhoods

June 3, 2008: Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Barack Obama to Tesco's Fresh & Easy in Our February 13 Piece: 'Build More Stores in Underserved Neighborhoods'

September 23, 2008: Food Retailing, Society & Economics: 'Food Deserts' and Public Health

March 20, 2009: Federal Government Spending Bill Increases WIC Voucher Program Dollars by $1.2 Billion; 21 Percent Increase

May 28, 2008: Las Vegas Market Report: A 'Food Desert' Neighborhood to Get A New Grocery Store; But it's Not A Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market

April 27, 2008: New Study Points to Increasing Urban 'Food Deserts' In North America: Locating Stores in 'Food Deserts' A Part of Fresh & Easy's Strategy

March 7, 2008: Former NBA All-Star and Sacramento Native Kevin Johnson is the Driving Force Behind a Fresh & Easy Market in Sacramento's Oak Park Neighborhood

July 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and San Francisco's Tenderloin Redux: Upcoming Developments Offer First Mover Opportunity For Fresh & Easy or Competitors

South Los Angeles Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Store to Accept WIC Vouchers July 29; Additional California Units to Follow

[Photo credit: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.]

Breaking Buzz

We reported on July 7, 2010 in this story - Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Start Accepting WIC Vouchers at Central & Adams Store in South Los Angeles This Month - that the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store at 1025 East Adams in South Los Angeles, California (pictured at top) would start accepting WIC Vouchers (Woman, Infant & Children Program) this month.

We can now report that the store, located at Central and Adams in South Angeles, will start accepting WIC Vouchers on Thursday, July 29.

Additionally, Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market will start excepting WIC Vouchers at numerous other Fresh & Easy grocery stores in California - including additional units in Southern California, as well as at stores in the Bakersfield and Fresno regions in the Central Valley - starting 30-45 days after the South Los Angeles store's July 29 start date, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned. The current internal target date is to have some of the additional stores accepting the vouchers one month from July 29.

Interestingly, read what we wrote in the three paragraphs (in italics) below, from our July 7, 2010 story:

According to our sources, the south Los Angeles store will be the only one of Tesco's current 159 Fresh & Easy stores that will accept the WIC Vouchers for a while. Sort of a test. But if all goes well - and it should since 99% of the grocery stores in California have been accepting WIC Vouchers for as long as the program has existed - its likely Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market will then start accepting the vouchers in some of its other stores, beginning with those in low-income neighborhoods like in Compton.

Were we Fresh & Easy, we wouldn't wait very long to roll out the acceptance of WIC to all 159 stores. Why wait? It's an accepted method of payment to nearly all grocers in the United States. A number of convenience stores even accept WIC, as do a growing number of farmers markets.

In fact, we suspect once Fresh & Easy sees the nice sales boost it gets at the Central & Adams store on WIC-eligible items (and thus an overall store sales boost) like infant formula, whole milk, juice, eggs, cheese, whole grain breads and cereals, peanut butter, beans and legumes, fresh produce and more, it just might (or at least should) want to accept WIC right away at its other stores.

The Central and East Adams Fresh & Easy market in South Los Angeles will be the first store in the chain of 159 units to accept WIC Vouchers, as we've previously reported.

Including the Bakersfield and Fresno regions in the WIC Voucher-acceptance roll out will benefit Fresh & Easy in the form of added sales at the stores it designates to accept WIC in the two Central Valley regions. In fact, as we've said since 2008, the fresh food and grocery chain should accept WIC at every one of its stores in California, Nevada and Arizona.

Based on a recent analysis we completed of WIC usage patterns at grocery stores in the Central Valley region, we believe Fresh & Easy could increase its overall sales in the Fresno and Bakersfield regions by at least 5% overall by accepting WIC at all the stores.

California's Central Valley has been one of the hardest hit regions in the U.S. in terms of high unemployment and added poverty since the recession hit three years ago. For example, the unemployment rate in the region currently ranges from 15% -to- 20%, depending on the county. That's compared to an overall rate of 12.6% in California. Much of the Central Valley, like South Los Angeles (and other parts of Southern California), also suffers from high non-recession rates of poverty.

Additionally, the Central Valley, including the Bakersfield and Fresno regions, has among the highest percentage of WIC Voucher users in California. The vouchers are distributed by California WIC to low income mothers who qualify. WIC Vouchers can only be used to purchase specific healthy and nutritious food and beverage items, such as infant formula, whole milk, whole grain bread and cereals, juices, fresh produce and other similar items. Learn more about California WIC here.

Every state in the U.S., including Nevada and Arizona where the other Fresh & Easy stores are located, has a program similar to California WIC. Funding for WIC Vouchers is provided to the states primarily by the U.S. Federal Government.

South Los Angeles has a high percentage of WIC Voucher users, as noted in numerous past stories on the topic in Fresh & Easy Buzz.

In fact, employees at the Central and Adams neighborhood Fresh & Easy, which opened in February of this year, for the last five months have regularly had to explain to the numerous customers with WIC Vouchers, that the store - and Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market - doesn't except WIC. Beginning on July 27 the store workers at the South Los Angeles Fresh & Easy market will no longer have to do so. [See - February 23, 2010: Food Deserts & WIC Vouchers: Half A Loaf For the New Fresh & Easy Store Opening Tomorrow in South Los Angeles and February 24, 2010: Fresh & Easy Store Opens its Doors in South Los Angeles

[Editor's Note: Nearly three years ago, Fresh & Easy Buzz first pointed out and reported on the fact that Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, which opened its first stores in November 2007, didn't accept WIC Vouchers.

Additionally, in analysis and commentary pieces beginning in 2008 - and right up until the grocer decided to accept the vouchers at its first store, which will be the Central and Adams unit in South Los Angeles, on July 29 - we've also pointed out in detail how, from both business (added sales) and ethical grocer perspectives, Fresh & Easy was missing the boat by not accepting WIC in its stores. [Suggested reading: September 7, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Should Tesco's Fresh & Easy Put An Asterisk Next to its Motto? Yes; Unless it Corrects Four Operational Omissions and December 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy, 'Food Deserts' and WIC Vouchers; A 'Year-End' Analysis & Commentary]

Below is a selection of some of those past, and related, stories from Fresh & Easy Buzz:

July 7, 2010: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Start Accepting WIC Vouchers at Central & Adams Store in South Los Angeles This Month

September 7, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Should Tesco's Fresh & Easy Put An Asterisk Next to its Motto? Yes; Unless it Corrects Four Operational Omissions.

December 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy, 'Food Deserts' and WIC Vouchers; A 'Year-End' Analysis & Commentary

February 10, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Opens Latest New Store in 'Food Desert' City of Compton, California

July 2008: Tesco's to Open A Fresh & Easy Grocery Market in Low Income, Underserved South Central Los Angeles Neighborhood

March 7, 2009: Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track

July 11, 2008: 'Food Desert' Neighborhoods and Southern California: More on the Fresh & Easy Store Planned For South Central Los Angeles

July 15, 2008: Fresh Food to Bloom in An Inner-City Food Desert: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Breaks Ground For New Store in Underserved South Los Angeles Neighborhood

February 23, 2010: Food Deserts & WIC Vouchers: Half A Loaf For the New Fresh & Easy Store Opening Tomorrow in South Los Angeles

February 24, 2010: Fresh & Easy Store Opens its Doors in South Los Angeles

April 22, 2010: Breaking Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Accept WIC Vouchers at its East Adams Store in South Los Angeles

May 14, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Not Yet Accepting WIC Vouchers at South L.A. Store; No Start Date Set

July 6, 2008: Former NBA Great Earvin 'Magic' Johnson is Working His Business Magic in Urban, Inner City Neighborhoods; We Offer An Idea For Tesco's Fresh & Easy

May 12, 2008: Food Deserts: Coalition to Create 'Blue Ribbon' Commission, Draft Report to Encourage Grocers to Open Stores in Underserved Los Angeles Neighborhoods

February 13, 2008: Leading Democratic Candidate for President Barack Obama Joins Group in Asking Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Put More Stores in Underserved Neighborhoods

June 3, 2008: Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Barack Obama to Tesco's Fresh & Easy in Our February 13 Piece: 'Build More Stores in Underserved Neighborhoods'

September 23, 2008: Food Retailing, Society & Economics: 'Food Deserts' and Public Health

March 20, 2009: Federal Government Spending Bill Increases WIC Voucher Program Dollars by $1.2 Billion; 21 Percent Increase

May 28, 2008: Las Vegas Market Report: A 'Food Desert' Neighborhood to Get A New Grocery Store; But it's Not A Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market

April 27, 2008: New Study Points to Increasing Urban 'Food Deserts' In North America: Locating Stores in 'Food Deserts' A Part of Fresh & Easy's Strategy

March 7, 2008: Former NBA All-Star and Sacramento Native Kevin Johnson is the Driving Force Behind a Fresh & Easy Market in Sacramento's Oak Park Neighborhood

July 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and San Francisco's Tenderloin Redux: Upcoming Developments Offer First Mover Opportunity For Fresh & Easy or Competitors

You can read additional stories on the topic from the archives here

Going Rural: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Build First Store in Los Banos, California

Northern California Special Report: Central Valley

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market plans to build a 13,969 square-foot store in Los Banos, California, a rural city of 36,198 located in California's Central Valley. The store will be Tesco's first Fresh & Easy unit in the city, which is in Merced County. It will also be the grocer's first store in Merced County.

Los Banos is considered part of Northern California, although it's right on the border-line. Cities south of Los Banos, like Fresno, are more properly referred to as being in Central California.

The City of Los Banos Planning Commission approved Fresh & Easy's site plan for the store on Wednesday, May 26. The commission also approved the use of an off-sale wine and beer sales license, which Fresh & Easy has applied for with the State of California, for the location.

The site plan approval is based on a set of design and other related conditions [see here] that Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market and its store designers and building contractors must follow. The approval also expires in one year if Fresh & Easy doesn't obtain a building permit in that time period, although there is an option to extend the approval for an additional year.

According to the city's planning department staff, neither Tesco's Fresh & Easy or its representatives have said when construction of the store would begin. Fresh & Easy Buzz would be surprised is the grocer breaks ground on the site this year.

The Los Banos City Council must grant final approval of the site plan. There wasn't any organized opposition against the store voiced at Wednesday's planning commission meeting. Therefore it's likely the Los Banos City Council will follow the planning commission's lead and grant final approval.

The future Fresh & Easy store will be in an existing shopping center, The Los Banos Marketplace, at 1420 E. Pacheco Boulevard. The center's major tenants include Walgreens, Starbucks, Quiznos and Jack in the Box.

There's a vacant building on the 1.22 acre site earmarked for the Fresh & Easy market. According to the planning commission documents, the grocer plans to demolish the building and build the 13,969 store from the ground up. Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has purchased the 1.22 acre parcel.

The city of Los Banos has a community design standards ordinance for the part of the city where the Fresh & Easy store is planned. Keeping with the city's history and culture (agrarian) and heritage (Spanish), the design standards are of a Spanish-Mission style. The Fresh & Easy store's architects have followed these community design standards, according to the city's planning department staff.

Among the local (Spanish-Mission style) design characteristics and features of the Fresh & Easy store are: a tiled roof, arched entry doors and window openings, arcaded porches, a walled garden, towers and accentuated corner parapet elements, varied roof heights, and ornamental brick to enhance the Spanish-Mission architecture motif. [Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market went through a lengthly hearing process in 2008 regarding a proposed store in Sacramento's Oak Park neighborhood, which the grocer to date hasn't broke ground on. We wrote a series of stories on the issue, which you can read here.]

Los Banos, which is the second-largest city in Merced County after the city of Merced, is about 72 miles from Fresno, where Tesco's Fresh & Easy has a number of stores.

Additionally, Los Banos is about a 90 minute drive to San Jose in the southern Bay Area, and about two and a half hours (about 130 miles) from both Sacramento and San Francisco.

It's proximity to San Jose has made Los Banos a major commuter city over the last decade because housing costs are 50%-60% (or higher) less than they are in the San Jose Metropolitan region. In fact, Los Banos has been hit so hard by the housing foreclosure crisis since 2008 that houses which sold in the $300,000 -to- $400,000 range in 2006 are today selling for almost half that amount. Merced County has been among the top five counties in the U.S. for housing foreclosures for nearly three years.

According to published data, the housing market in Merced County and Los Banos is beginning to pick up, although it's got a very long way to go. Additionally, unemployment in the county, which is primarily an agricultural and agribusiness-based economy, is 19.9%, according to the most-recent state figures, making it among the highest of all California counties. California's overall unemployment rate is currently 12.6%.

Locating a store in Los Banos is something we predicted Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market would do as far back as 2008. It's part of what we call Fresh & Easy's Northern California and Central Valley "critical mass" store location strategy, which is modeled after what the grocer has been and is doing in Southern California, Metropolitan Los Vegas, Nevada and Metro Phoenix, Arizona. Essentially, the strategy is to first grab store sites in the major cities in a given region, then fill in with locations in nearby suburban and smaller cities. It's also further evidence the grocer has an urban, suburban and rural store location strategy.

In the case of the Central Valley and Northern California, Fresh & Easy first obtained store sites in Bakersfield, Fresno, Modesto and Stockton, the key big cities in the Central Valley, now its starting to fill in around those major cities in places like Los Banos. Fresh & Easy has only opened stores in the Bakersfield and Fresno regions to date, although it has locations in Modesto and Stockton, as we've reported previously in Fresh & Easy Buzz. (Los Banos is about 41 miles from Modesto, which is in the Northern Central Valley. Fresh & Easy has three future store sites in Modesto.)

In Northern California, Fresh & Easy first concentrated on securing store locations (37 confirmed sites but additional unconfirmed locations we've reported on) in the San Francisco Bay Area and the Metropolitan Sacramento region's major cities and larger suburban towns. It then has been slowly branching out to smaller cities in the regions.

Of course none of the Northern California Fresh & Easy stores have yet to open. The grocer has postponed its launch into the region at least twice sine 2008. and to date hasn't talked about Northern California publicly at all. However, it still has all or most of the store sites, as we've reported on recently. [April 19, 2010 - Tesco Debating Whether to Launch Fresh & Easy Into Northern California This Fiscal Year... or Wait]

Fresh & Easy is also looking at potential store locations near Los Banos and elsewhere in Merced County and the Northern Central Valley, which includes the Modesto and Stockton Metro regions, as we've detailed in our ongoing reporting. For example, the grocer is looking at potential sites for Fresh & Easy stores in the Merced county cities of Merced and Atwater. Both cities are about 25 miles from Los Banos.

The fact Tesco is continuing to book future store locations in Northern California, despite having yet to open any of its stores in the region, should put to rest any rumors out there it plans to fold up shop with its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood market any time in the near future, despite the fact it recently reported another full-year loss of over $250 million for the chain.

There are currently two major supermarkets in Los Banos, a Save Mart supermarket, which is a branch of Modesto, California-based Save Mart Supermarkets, and a Food 4 Less warehouse market, which is part of a chain operated by a Northern California independent group. There's also a couple smaller, independent grocery stores and a branch of the regional El Pueblo Hispanic supermarket chain in the city.

Walmart has a discount format store in Los Banos, which it plans to remodel and turn into a hybrid supercenter, offering a full-selection of fresh foods and groceries. There's also a farily new Target discount format store in the city. It sells a fairly strong selection of groceries but not fresh foods.

In past analysis pieces in Fresh & Easy Buzz of the Central Valley region and its various grocery retailing markets we've identified Los Banos as a city that's underserved by grocery stores, based on our research and analysis.

There are currently 159 Fresh & Easy fresh food and grocery stores in California (Southern California and the Bakersfield and Fresno regions in the Central Valley), southern Nevada and Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona.

No new Fresh & Easy stores are being opened this month. Additionally, the grocer hasn't (as of May 29) announced if it plans to open any stores in June.

Despite Postponing its Northern California Launch Again Earlier This Year Tesco's Fresh & Easy Planning Third San Francisco Store; First Stockton Unit

Upcoming New Markets Special Report: Northern California

Despite postponing its Northern California launch once again earlier this year, and having not yet opened any of the numerous Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store sites it's paying monthly lease payments on in Northern California, Tesco is planning a third store in San Francisco, California, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy has also signed a lease for what will be its first small-format grocery and fresh foods market in the Northern San Joaquin Valley city of Stockton, in Northern California. Stockton is located about 75 miles from San Francisco and about 30 miles from Modesto, where we've previously reported the grocery chain now has three Fresh & Easy stores planned.

San Francisco

The planned third San Francisco Fresh & Easy market will be located at 32nd and Clement Street in the City's Richmond District.

The two other planned Fresh & Easy store locations in San Francisco are at 5800 Third Street and Carrol Avenue in the low-income Bayview-Hunters Point Neighborhood, and at Silver Avenue and Goettingen Street, which is a mixed-use residential and commercial neighborhood in the city off of the 101 freeway.

The 5800 Third Street Fresh & Easy store is a new, built from the ground up store which will be the ground floor retail anchor to what is a multi-unit residential condominium building currently being constructed at the location.

The Silver Avenue Fresh & Easy market is planned to go into what is a now vacant building that previously housed a Cala Foods supermarket. Like many of its current 118 stores in California (Southern and Bakersfield), southern Nevada and Metro Phoeniz, Arizona, the Silver Avenue vacant, former supermarket building will be gutted and remodeled by Tesco and turned ino one of its small-format combination grocery and fresh foods markets.

Cala is (or more precisely was) owned by Kroger Co. Kroger Co., through its Ralphs supermarkets division based in Southern California, exited the Northern California market a few years ago, selling off or closing its about 50 Ralphs' banner supermarkets and about 25 Cala and Bell Market banner stores in the region.

All of the Cala and Bell banner stores were in the Bay Area, most in San Francisco or nearby cities. The Ralphs' stores were in the Bay Area and parts of the Central Valley and Sacramento region.

Kroger's Southern California-based Ralphs still operates a couple Cala-Bell stores in the Bay Area, which it is in the process of either selling or closing.

It also operates a couple of its FoodsCo banner discount warehouse stores in the region, including one in San Francisco's Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood, not far from where Tesco is putting its Third Street Fresh & Easy market in the condominium development. Kroger-Ralphs has no plans to close the FoodsCo warehouse format stores in the region.

San Francisco's Richmond District is a part of the city, along with the next door Sunset District, that collectively also are referred to as "The Avenues," because its numbered streets -- all avenues -- start in the low numbers and run all the way to the high-forties as the streets get closer to the ocean. The Richmond and Sunset neighborhoods end at San Francisco's Ocean Beach, which is the end of land in the city's western portion.

The Richmond and Sunset neighborhoods, both the flatest residential parts of the city, run alongside San Francisco's famed Golden Gate Park -- the park is in the middle, dividing the two neigborhoods, which are two of the largest residential neighborhoods in the city in terms of the numbers of housing units and resident population. San Francisco's population is about 850,000.

There currently are a couple Safeway supermarkets in the Richmond district, along with a couple independent supermarkets. Safeway has a large store right near Ocean Beach that serves residents of both the Richmond and Sunset neighborhoods because of its central location. The store does are very high weekly sales volume.

Safeway Stores, Inc., which is the market share leader in the Bay Area and in the city of San Francisco, is based in Pleasanton, in the eastern part of the region, about 30 miles from San Francisco.

The 32nd and Clement proposed future Fresh & Easy store site once was home to a supermarket. However that store has since closed.

Tesco is only beginning the permitting and approval process for the 32nd and Clement store. And in San Francisco that can be a detailed and long process in terms of gaining approval.

For example, on Wednesday evening, April 15, Mark Warden, a vice president for the Costa Mesa-based Bergman Companies' design and building firm, will be making a presentation to the members of the Planning Association for the Richmond, which is an influencial group comprised of neighborhood residents, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned. The group's mission is to guide planning and development in its neighborhood.

The presentation is from 7 -to- 9 p.m. at the Richmond Recreation Center, 251 18th Avenue, San Francisco. The Bergman Companies' Warden, representing Tesco's Fresh & Easy, will detail the grocer's plans for the site, including the store's design and other details, according to a member of the neighborhood group, and a notice on the planning association's Web site.

In San Francisco gaining the approval of neighborhood associations -- there's one in nearly every neighborhood in what is a city comprised of many distinct neigborhoods --is crucial to gaining approval from the city to build a commercial project like a retail store.

Most neighborhood groups in San Francisco tend to favor local retail stores over chains, although that doesn't mean chain stores don't get approval in the city. It often depends on the neighborhood. A couple neighborhoods though actually no longer allow chain retail stores of any kind.

San Francisco neighborhood associations like the Richmond District group look not only at a retailer's proposed design for a store when evaluating a proposal -- it's size, physical design, energy use -- they also look at the retail company proposing the store -- it's ethical reputation, environmental policies, whether its union or non-union, for example -- in evaluating if they will support the development or not.

Neighborhood associations in San Francisco don't legally make the decisions as to whether or not retailers get the green light on new retail store proposals in the city -- city government does. But the groups are so influential that seldom does a project a neighborhood association is against get build in San Francisco. On the plus side, it's very seldom if ever the city refuses to approve a retail project supported by a neighborhood association.

This is a key reason that Tesco's Fresh & Easy is having its representative make a presentation to the Richmond District neighborhood planning group.

Other new Northern California developments

Modesto

Fresh & Easy Buzz reported in this March 31, 2009 piece [Despite Having Postponed its Northern California Launch Indefinitely; Tesco's Fresh & Easy Planning Third Store in Modesto, California] that Tesco is building its newest and what it plans to be its third Fresh & Easy Neighborhood market store in the Northern California city of Modesto.

Modesto, which has a population of about 205,000 residents, is located about 90 miles from San Francisco in the Northern San JoaquinValley. Modesto is about a 45 minute drive from the nearest Bay Area city, Livermore, which is located in the Easy Bay region.

Fresh & Easy Buzz has now learned from a commercial real estate source that Tesco is looking closely at a handful of potential sites in Modesto for a possible future fourth Fresh & Easy store location in the city. None of the Fresh & Easy stores have yet to open in Modesto, or anywhere in Northern California.

Tesco hasn't confirmed the three Fresh & Easy planned store sites in Modesto that we've reported on. However we've documented each location through various means, including physical observation of the site, through commercial real estate sources, and via the California Alcoholic Beverage Control Department, in the case of the two stores -- Sylvan Square and Oakdale Road --that Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has already applied for on sale beer and wine licenses for.

We agreed at the request of our source not to mention the potential sites Tesco's Fresh & Easy is looking at in Modesto for a possible fourth store at this point in time.

Stockton

Tesco's Fresh & Easy is also planning to build a store in Stockton, California, which like Modesto is located in the Northern San Joaquin Valley. Stockton is about 30 miles from Modesto, about 75 miles from San Francisco, and about a 30 -to- 40 minute drive from Livermore. This is the first future Fresh & Easy store site in Stockton we've been able to document.

The planned first Stockton Fresh & Easy market will be located in a redevelopment project in Stockton's Midtown area on what is the location of a former State of California mental hospital which was closed some years ago.

The 103 acre redevelopment site is now owned by the California State University System. Commercial real estate developer Grupe Co. is redeveloping the site, which is called University Place.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has signed a 25-year lease for an about 14,000 square foot parcel in the redevelopment project where it will build a fresh & Easy store from the ground up, according to our sources. Grupe Co. verifies the lease.

Plans call for a mixed-use residential and commercial development, including condominiums and apartments, along with office buildings and retail stores, at the 103 acre site. The development also is the future home for a new satellite campus of the California State University System, hence its name -- University Place.

The closest state university campus is about 35 miles away, in Sacramento. California State University, Stanislaus, which is located about 45 miles from Stockton, in Turlock near Modesto in Stanislaus County, operates a small satellite campus in Stockton. Sacramento State University also offers some classes in Stockton. But the city wants its own comprehensive satellite campus.

Colliers International, which has an office in Stockton, is marketing the University Park redevlopment project in partnership with developer Grupe Co.

We said well over a year ago, when we first reported on Tesco Fresh & Easy's plans to open stores in Northern California, that the grocer would be locating stores in Stockton.

Our research shows that whenever Tesco's Fresh & Easy leases a site for an initial store in a city like Stockton, more units will follow. As a result, look for addialtion Fresh & Easy store locations to come in the city. In fact, we are aware that Tesco is currently shopping for sites for additional Stockton stores.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's store location strategy is one we've termed a "critical mass" store location strategy, meaning it likes to open and operate numerous stores, located not far from one another in a city, especially in larger cities like Stockton, which has a population of about 320,000. The Modesto example is a good one. It started with one planned store site and is now up to three planned locations.

In terms of the "critical mass" store location strategy, think about what Walgreens does with its drug stores and what Starbucks does with its cafes, opening numerous stores not far from each other in various neighborhoods in a city, hoping that the stores will become defacto neighborhood retail outlets by virtue of their mass availability throughout a given city's various neighborhoods. Critical retail mass.

This (the "critical mass" store location strategy) is what Tesco's Fresh & Easy has been and is doing in its current markets in California (Southern and Bakersfield), Metropolitan Las Vegas, Nevada and in the Phonix, Arizona Metro region. The strategic goal being to become the "neighborhood" grocery market of choice. There are 118 Fresh & Easy stores split between these market regions.

Stockton is where Tesco plans to build its Northern California distribution center. That distribution center is nowhere near completed however. In fact, Tesco has in our analysis intentionally postponed completing its Northern California distribution center as part of its decision to postpone its Fresh & Easy store launch into the region. Tesco has yet to confirm the distribution center will be located in the Stockton area.

As we first reported over a year ago, Tesco has and continues to look for potential Fresh & Easy store sites in cities throughout the Bay Area, the Sacramento-Vacaville region, and in Northern California's Northern San Joaquin Valley (and elsewhere in Northern California), near the cities of Stockton and Modesto. Those cities include Tracy, Manteca and Ripon, along with Turlock, Patterson and Merced, as well as others.

Tesco at present has eight Fresh & Easy locations planned for Fresno, which is about 45 miles south of Merced (which is 30 miles south of Modesto) in the central-near-southern Central Valley.

The grocery chain currently has three stores open and operating in Bakersfield, which is in the southern Central Valley, with plans to open six more in the coming months. Bakersfield is closer to Southern California geographically than it is to Fresno (Central California) and the Northern San Joaquin or Central Valley in Northern California. A good rule of thumb is that anything north of Merced, including Merced, is considered Northern California. Fresno -to- Bakersfield is generally considered Central California. Southern California begins once over the Grapevine, which seperates the southern valley from Los Angeles.

Fresh & Easy Northern California

Originally Tesco planned to have its first Northern California stores opened by mid-2008. Then it said the first stores in the region would open in late 2008. Early this year the grocery chain said it was postponing its Northern California launch indefinately, leaving open the date when it would open its first stores in the region.

Tesco has confirmed it plans to open and initial 37 stores in Northern California; 18 in the San Francisco Bay Area and 19 in the Sacrameno-Vacaville region of Northern California. It's now been over 15 months since it confirmed the 37 Northern California locations.

Fresh & Easy Buzz however has identified numerous additional Northern California planned locations in adition to the 37 announced and confirmed by Tesco's Fresh & Easy.

Below is a list of the 18 planned Fresh & Easy store locations in Northern California's San Francisco Bay Area that have been confirmed by Tesco. Tesco's Fresh & Easy officially announced the 18 locations in January, 2008. [Read our January 30, 2008 story here: [Fresh & Easy Goes On the Record: Announces 18 Northern California Stores in the Bay Area .] Fresh & Easy Buzz had already reported on a number of the planned Northern California locations prior to the public announcement/confirmation by Tesco

The 18 confirmed San Francisco Bay Area locations

>Antioch: Somersville & Buchanan roads; Lone Tree & Golf Course
>Concord: Clayton & Ygnacio Valley roads
>Danville: Diablo Road & Interstate 680]
>Fairfield: Beck Avenue & West Texas Street
>Hayward: Mission Boulevard & Rousseau Street; A Street & Hesperian Boulevard
>Mountain View: Middlefield Road & Rengstorff Avenue
>Napa: Jefferson Street & Imola Avenue
>Oakland: 73rd & Bancroft avenues
>Oakley: Laurel Road & Ohara Avenue
>San Francisco: Third Street & Carroll Avenue; Silver Avenue & Goettingen Street
>San Jose: Bird & Minnesota avenues; Almaden Road & Curtner Avenue
>Sunnyvale: Tasman Drive & Fair Oaks Avenue
>Vallejo: Oakwood Avenue & Springs Road
>Walnut Creek: Ygnacio Valley Road & San Carlos Drive.

Below is a list of the planned Northern California Fresh & Easy store locations identified and reported on by Fresh & Easy Buzz (with the exception of the Seaside and Oroville locations which were first reported on by local newspapers), but not confirmed to date by Tesco:

San Francisco Bay Area

>Vallejo (two sites). Two additional Fresh & Easy locations in Vallejo; in addition to the Oakwood Avenue unit in the city confirmed by Tesco as one of the 18 sites listed above. Read our report - May 21, 2008: Breaking News: Tesco Has Two New Fresh & Easy Stores in the Pipeline For San Francisco Bay Area; Brings Total to Date to 20 Units For the Region

>Pacifica: 5550 Coast Highway. Pacifica is located about 12 miles south of San Francisco. [Read our report - June 12, 2008: Upcoming New Markets News: Tesco to Locate Yet Another Fresh & Easy Store in San Francisco Bay Area; 21 Thus Far By Fresh & Easy Buzz's Reporting.]

[Related stories: October 7, 2008: Fresh & Easy Corporate Reps to Meet With Pedro Point Pacifica, CA Neighborhood Residents to Address Concerns Over Store to Open in 2009. October 9, 2008: Pacifica, CA Mayor Jim Vreeland Says He's Excited to Have Fresh & Easy Store Coming to Pedro Point; Says New Center Will Be One of the Best in Town. October 13, 2008: Pacifica Riptide & Fresh & Easy Buzz Join Together to Offer Pacifica, California Citizen Opinions On the Fresh & Easy Store Coming to the City.]

>Palo Alto: Edgewood Plaza Shopping Center. [Read our report - October 15, 2008: Tesco to Locate Fresh & Easy Store in Palo Alto, California; it's First in the City and SF Bay Area Store Number 22 By Our Reporting.] Note: We wrote this piece [ Upcoming New Markets Special Report: Upscale Palo Alto, California is Laying Out the Welcoming Mat to Grocers: Will Fresh & Easy Knock On the Door?] five months earlier, On June 12, 2008. Tesco's Fresh & Easy did come knocking at Palo Alto's door.

[Related story - March 19, 2009: Another Tesco Fresh & Easy Future Market City Bans the (Plastic) Bag: No Plastic Carrier Bags In Palo Alto, CA Supermarkets Starting September 18th.

Sacramento-Vacaville region

Click here to view a list and map of the 19 Tesco-confirmed Fresh & Easy stores in the Sacramento-Vacaville region in Northern California.

Sacramento-Vacaville region - not confirmed by Tesco

>Suisun City: Sunset Shopping Center. Sunset Avenue and State Highway 12. Suisun City is located between Sacramento and the San Francisco Bay Area, not far from the city of Vacaville. [Read our report - September 11, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Adds Another Store to its Sacramento-Vacaville Market Region Portfolio in Northern California.]

Elsewhere Northern California - not confirmed by Tesco

>Seaside: West Broadway Village Shopping Center. Seaside is located in Monterey County, in Northern California's south-central coast region. Note: The Herald (Monterey County) newspaper first broke the story on the Seaside location. We followed-up and verified the site. [Read our report - July 27, 2008: Fresh Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, Tesco PLC and Related Food Retailing News and Insight.]

>Modesto (3 stores thus far). (1) Sylvan Square Shopping Center; Coffee Road and Sylvan Avenue. (2) 1717 Oakdale Road. (3) Crows Landing Road near Whitmore Avenue.

[Read our reports: Sylvan Square - May 10, 2008: New Markets: Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Move Into Modesto, California Market; Open its First Store in the City Early Next Year. 1717 Oakdale Road - November 6, 2008: Upcoming New Markets News: Tesco Will Open A Second Fresh & Easy Store in Modesto, California. Crows landing Road - March 31, 2009: Despite Having Postponed its Northern California Launch Indefinitely; Tesco's Fresh & Easy Planning Third Store in Modesto, California.]

>Oroville, Butte County: Goldtown Plaza Shopping Center. The local newspaper, the Oroville Mercury Register, first reported on this location. Fresh & Easy Buzz verifield the lease and added some details in our report. [Our report - December 4, 2008: Despite Postponing its Northern California Launch, Fresh & Easy Continues to Grab New Locations in the Region, Including Going Rural.] Oroville is located in a rural region north of Sacramento.

Possible but not yet verified category
>Grass Valley, Nevada County. The local The Union newspaper reported in December, 2008 that Tesco's Fresh & Easy was negotiating with the owner of a closed Ford auto dealership in the city's Goldtwon Plaza to lease the dealership for a Fresh & Easy store. We verified the negotiations but haven't been able to verify the signing of any lease. [Our report - December 4, 2008: Grasss Valley - More on the Northern California Rural Strategy: An Existing Ford Auto Dealership in Grass Valley, CA Could Become A New Fresh & Easy Market.] As a result, we put this potential location in the "possible but not varified category" and don't count it yet as a "verified" Northern California Fresh & Easy planned store location.

Updated May 6, 2009:

Below are additional planned Northern California Fresh & Easy store locations we've uncovered and reported on since this piece was published. Tesco's Fresh & Easy has not yet confirmed these planned locations:

San Francisco Bay Area

>San Francisco, California. 32nd and Clement, Richmond District. This is the third planned Fresh & Easy store for San Francisco thus far, based on our reporting See our April 13, 2009 story here: Despite Postponing its Northern California Launch Again Earlier This Year Tesco's Fresh & Easy Planning Third San Francisco Store; First Stockton Unit.

>Hercules, California. New Town Center planned development. Hercules is in the Easy Bay Area, in Contra Costa County. See our April 17, 2009 story here: Another Planned New Location For Tesco's Fresh & Easy in San Francisco Bay Area: Market to Be Retail Anchor of New Development in Hercules, CA.

>Pleasanton, California. Rose Pavillion Shopping Center. Santa Rita Drive and Rosewood Drive. Pleasanton is in the East Bay Area. See our April 19, 2009 story here: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Signs Lease For New Store in Pleasanton, CA; We Reported 15 Months Ago the SF Bay Area City Was in its Strategic Sites.

Elsewhere Northern California - not confirmed by Tesco

>Stockton, California. University Place development, Stockton. This is the first planned Fresh & Easy store for Stockton. Stockton is in the Northern San Joaquin Valley; about 30 miles from Modesto and 35 miles from Sacramento. See our April 17, 2009 story here: Despite Postponing its Northern California Launch Again Earlier This Year Tesco's Fresh & Easy Planning Third San Francisco Store; First Stockton Unit.

Related stories from Fresh & Easy Buzz:

>November 12, 2008: Analysis: Hard Times at Fresh & Easy - Northern California Expansion to Be Postponed or Shelved Do to Economy; But its Only a Symptom Not the Cause

>November 20, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market and Tesco's Lowered Expectations

>May 15, 2008: Fresh But Never Easy: Tesco's Long But Rapid South-North March in the Nation-State of California

>April 13, 2008: April 13, 2008: San Francisco: Cool Bay Breezes, A City Full of History, Cable Cars--And A 'Fresh & Easy' State of Mind

>July 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and San Francisco's Tenderloin Redux: Upcoming Developments Offer First Mover Opportunity For Fresh & Easy or Competitors

>December 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy, 'Food Deserts' and WIC Vouchers; A 'Year-End' Analysis & Commentary

>September 30, 2008: News & Analysis: Tesco Reports Half-Year Financials; Reports Loss For Fresh & Easy USA and Sales Per Square Foot Averages

>September 17, 2008: Store Workers at Huntington Beach Fresh & Easy Demand Union Recognition From Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market

>November 16, 2008: California: The State of the State and its Economy; Governor to Propose Tax Increases and Massive Spending Cuts to Fix $11 Billion Budget Shortfall

>February 11, 2009: Tesco to Open Third Bakersfield, California Fresh & Easy Store On February 25.

>December 3, 2008: Tesco Opens its First Two California Fresh & Easy Stores Outside of Southern California in the Central Valley City of Bakersfield Today

>November 5, 2008: Upcoming New Markets News: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Confirms Bakersfield, CA Stores; Says First Two Will Open Next Month on December 3rd, 2008

>March 10, 2008: Bakersfield, California Region Next Up On the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market New Store Parade

>May 24, 2008: Upcoming New Markets Special Report: The Changing 'Face' of Retailing in Bakersfield, California

>March 26, 2008: Mid-Week Tesco Fresh & Easy Roundup

>May 14, 2008: Fresh & Easy Buzz Exclusive: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Plans to Open Five Stores In the Fresno, California Metropolitan Region

>March 8, 2008: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Northern California DC Likely to Be At Arch Road Site In Stockton

>September 15, 2008: Wal-Mart Expanding its Discount Store-to-Supercenter Conversion Program As Part of its Strategy to Grab Even More Food and Grocery Sales Market Share

>December 29, 2008: Competitor News: Winco Foods to Expand in California and Nevada in 2009; Put Aggressive Focus on Central Valley, Northern California and Northern Nevada

>February 11, 2009: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Isn't the Only Food & Grocery Retailer With its Eyes on Bakersfield: Wal-Mart's Bakersfield Push and Central Valley, CA Strategy

>February 28, 2008: News & Analysis: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Confirms 19 Store Locations for the Sacramento-Vacaville Region in Northern California

>January 28, 2008: Fresh & Easy Applies For Liquor Licenses for Four Sacramento, California Stores

>Monday, November 17, 2008: Sacramento City Design Board Agrees With Oak Park Group on Design Changes For Proposed Fresh & Easy Store; Escrow Closed on $1.1 Million Parcel

>November 12, 2008: Analysis: Hard Times at Fresh & Easy - Northern California Expansion to Be Postponed or Shelved Do to Economy; But its Only a Symptom Not the Cause

>November 16, 2008: Tesco Fresh & Easy CEO Tim Mason Says He's 'Deliriously Happy' With the Chain's Progress Thus Far; We Prefer Andy Grove's 'Only the Paranoid Survive'

>Wednesday, October 8, 2008: Putting the 'Neighborhood' in Neighborhood Market: 'Localism' and Tesco's Proposed Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market in Sacramento's Oak Park

>Tuesday, October 7, 2008: Sacramento's Oak Park Neighborhood Association Files Appeal On Design of Proposed Neighborhood Fresh & Easy Store; Hearing Set For Oct.15

>Wednesday, October 15, 2008: Hearing Tonight For Sacramento, CA Neighborhood Group's Appeal of Design of Fresh & Easy Store Proposed For Their Oak Park Neighborhood

>December 3, 2008: Swearing-In of New Sacramento, CA Mayor Kevin Johnson Delayed A Few Hours Over A $2.2 Million Tesco Fresh & Easy Agenda Item

>July 16, 2008: Fresh Feature: A Former NBA All-Star Who Wants to Become Mayor, A Trade Union, And A Future Tesco Fresh & Easy Grocery Store In Sacramento, California

>April 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy an Issue in Sacramento, California Mayor's Race A Year Before its First Store in the Capital City Even Opens

>March 7, 2008: Former NBA All-Star and Sacramento Native Kevin Johnson is the Driving Force Behind a Fresh & Easy Market in Sacramento's Oak Park Neighborhood

>October 9, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Has Put 16 of its 93 Stores in Formerly Vacant Supermarket Buildings and Plans to Do More Coversions While the Deals Are Hot

>February 19, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Serving as an Economic Stimulus Package of Sorts for California's Troubled Commercial Retail Real Estate Industry

>January 30, 2009: Competitor News: Safeway Stores, Inc. Confirms Second Small-Format 'The Market' Unit to Be in San Jose, CA; Fresh & Easy Buzz Nailed it in June, 2008

>December 30, 2008: Competitor News: Smart & Final Appears Pleased With its Eight Hybrid 'Extra' Format Stores, More On the Way in 2009

>December 12, 2008: Competitor News: Safeway CEO Steve Burd Says Small-Format 'The Market' Is 'Good' So Far But Not 'Great;' But Must Be 'Great' in Order To Expand

>December 29, 2008: Competor News: Winco Foods to Expand in California and Nevada in 2009; Put Aggressive Focus on Central Valley, Northern California and Northern Nevada

>September 15, 2008: Wal-Mart Expanding its Discount Store-to-Supercenter Conversion Program As Part of its Strategy to Grab Even More Food and Grocery Sales Market Share

>May 18, 2008: Wal-Mart Looking For Sites in California For it's Small-Format 'Marketside' Grocery

>Tesco thus far has a couple Fresh & Easy stores planned for Northern Nevada, which is much closer geographically to Northern California (less than three hours from Sacramento), and is a much more similar market to Northern California than it is to southern Nevada, which is one of Tesco Fresh & Easy's existing market regions, along with Southern California, Bakersfield and Metro Phoenix, Arizona. Story link: Reno-Sparks, Nevada.

[You can follow Fresh & Easy Buzz around on Twitter.com at www.twitter.com/freshneasybuzz.]

Two New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Open in Fresno, California Region Today

Customers wait to enter the New Fresh & Easy store in Fresno, California this morning. The grand opening started at 10 am.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market opened its two newest stores this morning to waiting crowds.

The two new markets, which make 165 Fresh & Easy stores as of today, are located in the Fresno Metropolitan region in California's Central Valley.

One store is in Fresno, in a shopping center on the southeast corner of Cedar and Shields avenues. The address is: 3040 North Cedar Avenue. The second Fresh & Easy market is right next door to Fresno, in Clovis. The Clovis store, the second Fresh & Easy unit in the city, is on the northwest corner of Herndon and Fowler avenues, at 1725 Herdon Avenue.

Grand opening celebrations, which started this morning at 10 am, are currently going on at both stores.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market now has seven stores in the Fresno Metropolitan region. In addition to the two stores in Clovis, the opening of the new store today in Fresno makes a total of four Fresh & Easy units for Fresno. There's also a Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market fresh food and grocery store in Reedley, which is in the Fresno Metro region.

Seven & Seven [stores] for the Central Valley

In addition to its seven stores in the Fresno region in California's Central Valley, Tesco has seven Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market locations farther south in the valley, in the Bakersfield region. Five of the seven stores are in Bakersfield; one is in nearby Wasco; and the other in Delano.

Fresh & Easy by the (store) numbers - and regions

Below is a tally, as of today, of the 165 Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market stores by region:

~Southern California
=90 stores

~Central Valley, California/Bakersfield region
=7 stores

~Central Valley, California/Fresno region
=7 stores

~Metropolitan Las Vegas, Southern Nevada
=27 stores

~Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona region
=34 stores

~Total Number stores = 165

Three new stores opening next week

Three new Fresh & Easy markets are set to open on Wednesday, September 22.

All three of the markets are in the San Diego Metro region in Southern California. Two of the stores are in Oceanside and one unit is in San Diego. The locations of the stores are:

>32nd Street & University Avenue, San Diego, California
>River Road. & College Boulevard, Oceanside, California
>College Boulevard & Oceanside Boulevard, Oceanside, California

The September 22 openings are the last three new stores, of the nine units that will have been opened by Tesco's Fresh & Easy this month, set to open in September. At the end of September, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood market will have 168 stores open and operating in California, southern Nevada and Metro Phoenix, Arizona.

Fresh & Easy Buzz has been calling this month 'Big Bag' September for Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market because of the high number - nine - stores it's opening this month.

But the fresh food and grocery chain didn't open any new stores in May, June, July or August 2010, instead it bunched them all up for openings this month - hence the 'Big Bang' title, so to speak. We reported Tesco's Fresh & Easy was doing this in a June 25, 2010 story: A Four Month Pause: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Set to Open Until September 2010].

Therefore, the high number of openings this month should be viewed in this light. For example, if the grocer opened just one new store a month, from May through August, and two stores this month, it would have achieved the same results, a total of nine new stores open and operating by the end of September 2010.

Fresh & Easy has followed this new store opening "bunching up" strategy all year.

To learn what the grocer did from February -to- April of this year in terms of new store openings, read our stories linked at the end of the piece here.

October 2010 openings

As of today, Tesco's Fresh & Easy hasn't announced any new store openings for October.

As we've previously reported, so far, according to our sources, three new stores are planned for October 2010 openings. However, new store openings are a moving target at Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market headquarters in El Segundo, California. Therefore the number of new stores to be opened in October could increase before the grocery chain makes an announcement, which should be coming soon. Our reporting and planned number of new stores, three, is only as of today.

Related Stories:

September 8, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Hits (and Breaks) the 100-Store Mark in California With Today's Openings

September 7, 2010: 'Big Bang' September: First Four of Nine New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Opening on September 8

July 14, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Confirms Our June 25 Report it Will Open Nine New Stores in September 2010

June 25, 2010: A Four Month Pause: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Set to Open Until September 2010

June 1, 2010: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Likely This Month

May 1, 2010: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Set to Open This Month

March 30, 2010: Tesco Set to Open 11 New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores in April

March 29, 2010: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Set to Hit 150-Plus Store-Count Mark on April 7

March 16, 2010: A New Fresh & Easy Store Opens in Las Vegas Tomorrow on St. Patrick's Day; Will Tesco CEO Sir Terry Leahy's Proud Irish Eyes Be Smiling?

March 7, 2010: Three New Fresh & Easy Stores Opening This Month; First Opening March 10 in Palm Springs, California

January 27, 2010: February New Store Opening 'Big Bang' For Tesco's Fresh & Easy; Nine New Stores So Far

February 24, 2010: Fresh & Easy Store Opens its Doors in South Los Angeles

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Confirms Our June 25 Report it Will Open Nine New Stores in September 2010

New Store Openings

On June 25, 2010 we reported in this story - A Four Month Pause: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Set to Open Until September 2010 - that Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market would open at least nine, and potentially as many as 10, new stores in September 2010. We also reported the grocer wouldn't open any new stores in either July or August, which it won't.

Below are the key paragraphs from our June 25, 2010 report:

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market currently has no plans to open any new stores in either July or August, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned. Our source information is strong enough on this that if Fresh & Easy were to open a store, say in August, it will be because the grocer decided to do so after today.

The next batch of new Fresh & Easy stores will likely open in September 2010, according to our information. Look for as many as 9-10 new store openings in September.

Today Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market issued a press release in which it announced it will open nine new stores in September. No new Fresh & Easy stores will open this month or in August.

The dates of the nine new store openings and the store locations are:

September 8th

>Hubbard St. & Gladstone Ave. Sylmar, Southern California
>Rosemead Blvd. & Valley Blvd. Rosemead, Southern California
>Rose Ave. & Gonzales Rd. Oxnard, Southern California Coast
>Cherry Ave. & 25th St. Signal Hill, Southern California

September 15th

>Cedar Ave. & Shields Ave. Fresno, California (Central Valley)
>Herndon Ave. & Fowler Ave. Clovis, California (Central Valley)

September 22nd

>32nd St. & University Ave. San Diego, California
>River Rd. & College Blvd. Oceanside, California
>College Blvd. & Oceanside Blvd. Oceanside, California

There are currently 159 Fresh & Easy fresh food and grocery stores located in California (Southern and the Central Valley), southern Nevada and Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona.

Ninety eight of the current 159 Fresh & Easy markets are located in Southern California and the Bakersfield and Fresno Metro regions in California's Central Valley; 34 units in Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona; and 27 stores in southern Nevada.

After the nine new stores open in September, the total Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store-count will be 168. Since all nine new stores are in California, it will raise the total store-count in the Golden State to 107, which will mean a significantly high percentage of Fresh & Easy sales will depend on how the stores perform in California, particularly in Southern California where the majority of the 107 units will be located.

We said in the blog that Fresh & Easy would continue to put its new store emphasis in Southern California - and it is. In fact, the grocer hasn't opened a new store in southern Nevada (Metro Las Vegas) in over a year. And its new store openings in Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona has been nearly as sparse.

You will no doubt see numerous publications run stories today and this week about the opening of the nine new stores, based on the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market press release the grocer issued today. But we're the only publication that actually reported it - and we did so three weeks ago.

Linkage - Related Stories:

June 25, 2010: A Four Month Pause: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Set to Open Until September 2010

June 1, 2010: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Likely This Month

May 1, 2010: No New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores Set to Open This Month

March 30, 2010: Tesco Set to Open 11 New Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores in April

March 29, 2010: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Set to Hit 150-Plus Store-Count Mark on April 7

March 16, 2010: A New Fresh & Easy Store Opens in Las Vegas Tomorrow on St. Patrick's Day; Will Tesco CEO Sir Terry Leahy's Proud Irish Eyes Be Smiling?

March 7, 2010: Three New Fresh & Easy Stores Opening This Month; First Opening March 10 in Palm Springs, California

January 27, 2010: February New Store Opening 'Big Bang' For Tesco's Fresh & Easy; Nine New Stores So Far

February 24, 2010: Fresh & Easy Store Opens its Doors in South Los Angeles

April 19, 2010: Tesco Debating Whether to Launch Fresh & Easy Into Northern California This Fiscal Year... or Wait

April 13, 2009: Despite Postponing its Northern California Launch Again Earlier This Year Tesco's Fresh & Easy Planning Third San Francisco Store; First Stockton Unit

January 14, 2010: UFCW Union Launches Informal Boycott of Fresno CA Fresh & Easy Stores Today; One Day After the Stores Open

April 20, 2010: Strong Group Revenue & Profit For Tesco... But $253 Million Loss at Fresh & Easy

June 23, 2010: Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason Gets Big Stock Award Featuring a Singular Twist

June 4, 2010: Every Little (Bit) Helps: Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Mason Paid $6.188 Million For 2009

June 21: The Missing Link in Tesco's Purchase of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Meat Supplier '2 Sisters Food Group'

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Store at Central & Adams in South Los Angeles is Now Accepting WIC Vouchers; Additional Stores to Follow

The Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store at 1025 East Adams Boulevard in South Los Angeles in now accepting WIC Vouchers (Woman, Infant & Children Program).

The store, located at Central and Adams in the low-income neighborhood, started accepting WIC this week, as we previously reported it would. (See our linked stories at the end of this piece.)

A Fresh & Easy Buzz reporter visited the store yesterday.

As we've previously reported, Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market plans to start rolling out the acceptance of WIC Vouchers to a number of its other stores in California, starting in about 30 -to- 45 days. Stores set to accept WIC then include additional Fresh & Easy units in Southern California, like the store in Compton, along with stores in the Bakersfield and Fresno areas in the Central Valley.

Currently there are no plans we're aware of to accept WIC at the 34 Fresh & Easy stores in Arizona or the 27 units in Metropolitan Las Vegas, Nevada. There are 98 Fresh & Easy markets located in Southern California and the Bakersfield and Fresno Metro Regions in the Central Valley.

Each U.S. state handles WIC individually, although most of the funding comes from the U.S. Federal Government via the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In California the program, which provides vouchers to mothers to purchase healthy foods and beverages like infant formula, whole milk, eggs, cheese, whole grain breads and cereals, fruit juices, fresh produce and other similar items for their children, is administered by California WIC.

[Editor's Note: Nearly three years ago, Fresh & Easy Buzz first pointed out and reported on the fact that Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, which opened its first stores in November 2007, didn't accept WIC Vouchers. Additionally, in analysis and commentary pieces beginning in 2008 - and right up until the grocer decided to accept the vouchers at its first store, which will be the Central and Adams unit in South Los Angeles, on July 29 - we've also pointed out in detail how, from both business (added sales) and ethical grocer perspectives, Fresh & Easy was missing the boat by not accepting WIC in its stores. [Suggested reading: September 7, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Should Tesco's Fresh & Easy Put An Asterisk Next to its Motto? Yes; Unless it Corrects Four Operational Omissions and December 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy, 'Food Deserts' and WIC Vouchers; A 'Year-End' Analysis & Commentary]

Below is a selection of some of those past stories from Fresh & Easy Buzz:

July 28, 2010: What A Long, Strange Trip it's Been: South Los Angeles Will Be First Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Store to Accept WIC Vouchers Starting Tomorrow

July 7, 2010: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Start Accepting WIC Vouchers at Central & Adams Store in South Los Angeles This Month

September 7, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Should Tesco's Fresh & Easy Put An Asterisk Next to its Motto? Yes; Unless it Corrects Four Operational Omissions

December 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy, 'Food Deserts' and WIC Vouchers; A 'Year-End' Analysis & Commentary

February 10, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Opens Latest New Store in 'Food Desert' City of Compton, California

July 2008: Tesco's to Open A Fresh & Easy Grocery Market in Low Income, Underserved South Central Los Angeles Neighborhood

March 7, 2009: Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track

July 11, 2008: 'Food Desert' Neighborhoods and Southern California: More on the Fresh & Easy Store Planned For South Central Los Angeles

July 15, 2008: Fresh Food to Bloom in An Inner-City Food Desert: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Breaks Ground For New Store in Underserved South Los Angeles Neighborhood

February 23, 2010: Food Deserts & WIC Vouchers: Half A Loaf For the New Fresh & Easy Store Opening Tomorrow in South Los Angeles

February 24, 2010: Fresh & Easy Store Opens its Doors in South Los Angeles

April 22, 2010: Breaking Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Accept WIC Vouchers at its East Adams Store in South Los Angeles

May 14, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Not Yet Accepting WIC Vouchers at South L.A. Store; No Start Date Set

July 6, 2008: Former NBA Great Earvin 'Magic' Johnson is Working His Business Magic in Urban, Inner City Neighborhoods; We Offer An Idea For Tesco's Fresh & Easy

May 12, 2008: Food Deserts: Coalition to Create 'Blue Ribbon' Commission, Draft Report to Encourage Grocers to Open Stores in Underserved Los Angeles Neighborhoods

February 13, 2008: Leading Democratic Candidate for President Barack Obama Joins Group in Asking Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Put More Stores in Underserved Neighborhoods

June 3, 2008: Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Barack Obama to Tesco's Fresh & Easy in Our February 13 Piece: 'Build More Stores in Underserved Neighborhoods'

September 23, 2008: Food Retailing, Society & Economics: 'Food Deserts' and Public Health

March 20, 2009: Federal Government Spending Bill Increases WIC Voucher Program Dollars by $1.2 Billion; 21 Percent Increase

May 28, 2008: Las Vegas Market Report: A 'Food Desert' Neighborhood to Get A New Grocery Store; But it's Not A Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market

April 27, 2008: New Study Points to Increasing Urban 'Food Deserts' In North America: Locating Stores in 'Food Deserts' A Part of Fresh & Easy's Strategy

March 7, 2008: Former NBA All-Star and Sacramento Native Kevin Johnson is the Driving Force Behind a Fresh & Easy Market in Sacramento's Oak Park Neighborhood

July 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and San Francisco's Tenderloin Redux: Upcoming Developments Offer First Mover Opportunity For Fresh & Easy or Competitors