Buy, Buy Tops Stores

I hope you are having a good week. I just heard on the news today that Giant Eagle has bought 18 Tops stores. Everyone knew this was coming but I will be really disappointed if I only have Giant Eagle to choose from for deal shopping. Right now, I split my shopping between Tops and Giant Eagle, always looking for the loss leaders. If Tops is gone, my choices are limited. Not looking like a good day for bargain shoppers!

Here's the article:
Tops Markets’ stores in Northeast Ohio are being lopped off from their parent company, Dutch grocer Royal Ahold N.V., which wants to sell them by the end of the year.The decision affects 46 stores in Greater Cleveland, Akron, Youngstown and Norwalk, and about 3,800 full- and part-time employees, who learned the news late Thursday.“This geographically separate region is no longer considered a core part of Tops’ market area,” Ahold said in a statement released late Thursday.“We want to focus our priorities on strengthening Tops’ position in our core markets in New York and Pennsylvania,” said Denny Hopkins, vice president of advertising and public relations for Tops and parent company Giant Food Stores LLC in Carlisle, Pa.... While Tops is the No. 1 grocer in its home turf of Greater Buffalo/Niagara, its Northeast Ohio stores have been bleeding sales and losing market share to market leader Giant Eagle Inc.While Tops had 28 percent of the Greater Cleveland grocery market in 2000, Tops’ market share had dropped to less than 25 percent by June 2005, according to Trade Dimensions International Inc., a firm that tracks market share. And that was before arch-rival Giant Eagle started heavily promoting its lowered prices, in-store butchers and Fuelperks gasoline-discount program.Retail analyst Robert Antall, chief executive of LakeWest Group LLC in Cleveland, said Ahold had been struggling to find a spot for the Tops stores in a marketplace being invaded by discounters like Wal-Mart and Marc’s Deeper Discount Stores.