Cub Foods

Cub Foods is a supermarket chain with seventy-seven stores in Minnesota and Illinois.^[1] The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Eden Prairie, Minnesota-based SuperValu Inc. The store was famous for being “no frills; sack your own groceries ...”

History

Beginnings

Cub Foods was founded by Minnesota-based Hooleys Supermarkets in 1968 in the riverside city of Stillwater by brothers, Charles and Jack Hooley, brother-in-law Robert Thueson, and Culver Davis jr. The name “CUB” originally stood for Consumers United for Buying, and Cub Foods was one of the first total discount food stores in the United States^[1] The chain was bought by Minnesota-based SuperValu in 1980 with five stores in the Twin Cities. After the purchase, the chain expanded to 83 stores, in three states. Until 1999, WinCo Foods operated several Cub Foods stores. Cub Foods also operated eight stores in Colorado until 2003 when they sold most of their stores to Kroger. The chain also had locations operated by Delhaize Group in parts of the Southern United States, namely in the Atlanta and Nashville areas in the 1980s and 90s.^[2]

Cub Foods operated four stores in Columbus, Ohio: 3600 Soldano Boulevard (W. Broad & Wilson Road), Consumer Square East (Brice Rd. and Tussing), 2757 Festival Lane (Sawmill & SR 161), and Columbus Square (SR 161 and Forest Hills Boulevard). On May 23, 1997, all four stores and its employees were acquired by Kroger. The Kroger at Columbus Square closed in July 2011.^[3][4]

Cub Foods is credited with many innovations, such as the first grocery check out conveyor belt system.

Lofino Joint Venture

Cub Foods also had a joint venture with a local grocer Mike Lofino in the Dayton, Ohio market, which operated four stores under the Cub Foods banner. SuperValu sold off its share of the venture in 1995, although three stores continued to use the Cub Foods name for well over a decade under a franchise agreement with Mike Lofino and SuperValu. In 2007 the Huber Heights, Ohio location closed and the Trotwood, Ohio location closed in 2013. On September 30, 2012, Lofino closed stores that anchored the Sugarcreek Plaza Shopping Center in Sugarcreek Township, Ohio and the Southland 75 Shopping Center in Miami Township, Ohio and defaulted on the underlying lease obligations, forcing the shopping centers into bankruptcy. Members of the grocery store management team, led by CFO Martin Sloan, exploited provisions of the United States Bankruptcy Code and his relationships with local creditor lending institutions, to take over property management operations of the shopping centers formerly anchored by the failed Cub operations.

Following this transition into the property management business, Mike Lofino "made the strategic business decision to relinquish his interest in the retail grocery business^[5]" and sold the Lofino owned Save-A-Lot stores owned and closed the Lofino's Marketplace in Beavercreek, Ohio which was supplied through SuperValu.

Effects from Albertsons merger

As part of SuperValu's acquisition of New Albertsons, including its Chicago-based Jewel-Osco stores, SuperValu divested its Chicago-area Cub Foods locations to an investment group headed by Cerberus Capital Management, to avoid market concentration issues. (The Cerberus-led group would later acquire New Albertsons from SuperValu in March 2013, reuniting the two Albertsons companies under the common holding company Albertsons LLC.) Since Cerberus took control, four locations (Algonquin, Bedford Park, 87th Street in Chicago, and Naperville) closed, and Cerberus then announced that it was selling the remaining Illinois stores to other operators.^[6] The last of the Chicago area Cub Foods stores closed on December 10, 2006. A majority of them were sold to Central Grocers Cooperative and are operated as Strack & Van Til and Ultra Foods by a wholly owned unit of the cooperative, and as Garden Fresh Markets by one of its members;^[7] others were sold to Grand Mart International Foods. However, only four of the eight stores sold to Grand Mart ever opened under that company's ownership, and all were closed after less than five months of operation.

As of June 2009, the only remaining Cub Foods stores in Illinois which were still owned by SuperValu were one store in Peoria (a second store in Midtown Plaza in Peoria closed in March 2009 after just six-and-a-half years of operation) and one store in Freeport.

On October 9, 2010, the Cub Foods in Peoria, still owned and operated by SuperValu, changed its name to Shop 'n Save. This made the Freeport store the only remaining SuperValu-owned store in Illinois to continue to operate as a Cub Foods location.

Three Springfield, Illinois stores independently owned by Niemann Foods (two of which are former Jewel-Osco stores acquired from the Cerberus-led group) had a franchise to use the Cub Foods name as part of the stores' branding. These stores also carried selected Cub Foods-branded products under the same agreement. As of recently, these three stores no longer use the Cub Foods name; instead, they are now called County Market (another trademark owned by SuperValu but franchised to independent grocers). A Niemann-owned store in Bloomington, Illinois used the Cub Foods name under license from SuperValu until it closed in 2015.

Former slogans

(Incomplete List)

• "Cub Foods. A new way to run a supermarket."
• "The Low Price Leader"
• "Great Food, Great Prices"
• "Save More, Get More"
• "Where the Great Taste of Food Costs Less"
• "I ♥ My Cub" (Made a brief return as a promotion for CUB's 40th birthday)
• "The Store Next door" ^[6]
• "Bring more to your table"
• "Your Holiday List For Less" (2009 Holiday slogan for all Supervalu stores)
• "The People You Trust, The Store You Know" (Cub Pharmacy slogan 2006-2009)
• "Helping hands are just around the corner" (Cub Pharmacy slogan 2009-2010)
• "Good Things Are Just Around The Corner..."
• "Plenty Fresh For Plenty Less." (Cub Foods slogan 2010-2011)
• "For People who Love to Save Money." Current Dayton Market Slogan
• "My neighborhood. My Cub."
• "Better Fresh, Better Value" (Current Cub Foods slogan)

Customer Data Security Breaches

Parent company SuperValu sent a letter to customers on August 25, 2014 that My CUB Rewards members who provided their data and shoppers who used credit cards during the period between June 22, 2014 (at the earliest) through July 17, 2014 (at the latest) at 209 SuperValu stores and stand-alone liquor stores may have been affected by a data security breach. SuperValu posted this information on their website in a press release dated August 14, 2014. Information on the affected stores and eligibility for customers on identity protection programs are available on SuperValu's press release site.^[8]

See also

• WinCo Foods
• Jewel-Osco

References

External links

• Official Cub Foods site
• Cub Foods Site for Dayton, Ohio Market