The Anchorage Assembly will consider on Tuesday a resolution that would ask the Federal Trade Commission to block a merger between Kroger, which is part of the Fred Meyer empire, and Albertsons, which owns Safeway.
Assembly Chair Chris Constant says that food insecurity and market competition are factors in the food landscape in Anchorage and the state of Alaska that lead him to want to block the merger.
Earlier this month, Kroger and Albertsons announced they would sell off 413 grocery stores across 17 states as part of the proposed merger, in order to ensure that there is enough competition and to avoid a confrontation with the FTC and the unions that oppose the merger.
Some 14 Alaska Albertsons stores would be sold, representing 3 percent of the total number of stores jettisoned in the merger. No Fred Meyer would be sold off in the merger. That compares with 104 Albertsons and Kroger stores that would be sold off in Washington state.
If the FTC approves the merger, the deal “ensures no stores will close as a result of the merger and that all frontline associates will remain employed,” according to a statement by Kroger and Albertsons this month.
The list of stores to be sold to ensure the merger can go through includes:
Kroger released a list of how many stores per state would be part of the divesture:
- Alaska: 14 Albertsons stores
- Arizona: 24 Albertsons stores
- California: 66 Albertsons and Kroger stores
- Colorado: 52 Albertsons stores
- District of Columbia/Maryland/Virginia: 10 Harris Teeter stores
- Idaho: 13 Albertsons stores
- Illinois: 14 Kroger stores
- Montana/Utah/Wyoming: 12 Albertsons stores
- Nevada: 15 Albertsons stores
- New Mexico: 12 Albertsons stores
- Oregon: 49 Albertsons and Kroger stores
- Texas/Louisiana: 28 Albertsons stores
- Washington: 104 Albertsons and Kroger stores
The item is early on the agenda for the Anchorage Assembly, which meets on the ground floor of the Loussac Library on Tuesday, beginning at 5 pm.
