Alina Selyuk
Appearances
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
Yeah, so the $25 billion grocery merger is over. Yesterday, the deal got a double whammy of legal losses. A federal judge in Oregon and a state judge in Washington, in two separate cases, blocked the merger from going through in rulings that were about an hour within each other. And this was after two years of the companies trying to get this merger approved.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
And they did have an option to appeal and keep fighting, but Albertsons has now walked away. Albertsons has sued Kroger, claiming willful breach of contract, failure to put in best efforts to secure regulatory approval of the merger. Now, Kroger has quickly rebutted, saying it is Albertsons that's deflecting its own responsibilities. So they're now in a trading blame stage.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
Yeah, yeah. It was in late 2022 when Kroger first said it would buy Albertsons. It bid nearly $25 billion, and this would have combined the two biggest supermarket chains in the U.S. And you might know these chains under different names. Kroger runs Ralph's, Harris Teeter, Fred Meyer, King Soopers, and others. Albertsons owns Safeway and Vons.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
They have thousands of stores, and they knew this merger would be a tough sell for regulators. And indeed, the Federal Trade Commission sued them, so did several states, asking courts to block the merger. Overall, the process has been very expensive and a pretty unpopular deal. It's been criticized by Democrats and Republicans.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
And, you know, shoppers use it to air grievances about expensive groceries.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
So government lawyers argued Kroger and Albertsons often compete head to head, that they keep tabs on each other's prices, store hours, quality of products. And so putting two rivals under one roof would leave shoppers worse off, fewer choices, higher prices.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
Kroger and Albertsons made the case that the merger was a matter of survival, that their biggest rivals are not conventional supermarkets like themselves, but giants like Walmart, Costco, Amazon. They said only together could they compete with these companies long term. And they even argued that together they would have had more power to lower prices for shoppers.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
No, they did not. The U.S. district judge wrote essentially that she understood that competition with Walmart was real. It was tough, but it could not justify an otherwise illegal merger. And the judges also did not buy the company's plan to create essentially a new rival for themselves. They had planned to sell stores in markets where they overlap, and the judges did not approve of that.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
Well, you know, given how much of a knockout, drag out legal fight it has been so far, I feel like we could be in for a pretty bitter litigation now between the two of them. There is money at stake, which is the merger breakup fee. And Albertsons was the company getting acquired. So there is a chance that Albertsons puts itself back on the block again.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
They might try to find someone else to buy it. Now, as far as shoppers are concerned, for now, they can keep going back to their familiar grocery stores.
Up First from NPR
Syria's New Reality, Shooting Suspect's Ideology, Judges Block Grocery Merger
Thank you.