Delhaize Ending Bloom Food Concept

Delhaize Group (Brussels, Belgium) is shutting the doors on 113 Food Lion stores and eliminating its Bloom banner, reports Supermarket News.

“This decision is in line with our ‘New Game Plan,’ which is aimed at accelerating profitable growth,” says Pierre-Olivier Beckers, president and ceo, Delhaize Group.

The company announced it will convert 42 of its Bloom stores to Food Lion and closing the remaining seven locations. “It was a good concept,” Neil Stern, senior partner, McMillan Doolittle (Chicago), told Supermarket News. “In the last three or four years, they had done a nice job finding a voice for Bloom as being very customer-friendly, easy to use and easy to shop. The macro problem with Bloom is, how do you support from an expense standpoint a new banner that doesn’t really have any meaningful market share anywhere? It became a very expensive proposition to keep the thing going.”

Bloom hit the market in 2004 with an emphasis on convenience, prepared foods and technology, including handheld scanners and electronic kiosks.

Parent company Delhaize is also converting 22 of its price-impact Bottom Dollar Food locations in North Carolina, Virginia and Maryland, and closing six remaining Bottom Dollar Food stores in those markets. The company also plans to close a distribution center in the U.S. and 20 stores in Southeastern Europe.