esrosedotblog

LONG SLOW DEATH

Dave sent this sad news.

Grocer A&P files for Chapter 11 reorganization

My Dad worked for A&P for 45 years. He was a store manager and then joined the union and worked as the most senior employee in his region.

At first he ran a "service store" where you went to a clerk who delivered all your stuff to the counter. Then a small self service store.

I started working for the company in his store while I was in high school and then did one summer between my freshman and sophomore years in college.

When I worked for them they were the second largest food retailer in the United States, after Safeway stores.

It was a family owned company and didn't get out of the family situation fast enough. Heirs ran it into the ground and then a German outfit bought it.

I last saw an A&P store in Provincetown, MA. It was a crazy place to have a store, at the end of Cape Cod, with no stores between it and someplace in Connecticut. A distribution nightmare typical of the waning management skills of the Hartford family.

It is too bad. They own other stores now. So the brand is even more diluted.

Of course, they blame the unions. I was there when the union took over and was a member.

It wan't the unions. It was entrenched, unwilling to change, management.

Once a brave leader, now a sad spectacle. An old story.

Too bad.

Labels: family, food, history, life