The Friday Checkout is a weekly column providing more insight on the news, rounding up the announcements you may have missed and sharing what’s to come.
Kroger CEO Greg Foran knows the supermarket chain needs to do a better job of competing with the likes of Walmart, Costco and Aldi. Matching these competitors on price is a tall order — but he knows Kroger needs to narrow the gap.
In an interview with Bloomberg, Foran indicated Kroger plans to introduce sweeping price cuts. He didn’t say when this will happen or how much it will cost, but he noted that the company is preparing to test the price cuts before rolling them out widely to stores. Kroger plans to import more products directly and hone its use of technology to help fund the cuts, he noted.
Judging from the interview and other comments he’s made since taking the helm, Foran’s strategy seems focused on closing the distance on pricing between Kroger and low-price competitors, then speeding ahead with improvements in fresh and customer service.
“I think about our business a bit like a Formula One race. There’s a lead group of cars that are doing a very good job,” Foran told Bloomberg. “Our objective is to get out of the midfield and start lapping faster, make up the gap on the first-group cars and then ideally pass them.”
Walmart, for one, isn’t taking any of this lying down. On the same day Bloomberg’s story came out, the mass merchandiser noted it had expanded its own price cuts to more than 7,000 items. Those will help the company continue to make inroads with price-sensitive customers, but the chain did note that high fuel prices could put pressure on prices later this year.
Foran, an old-school merchant who became an industry star by leading Walmart’s U.S. grocery business, seems to be taking the steps that many experts expected. He’s bringing discipline and efficiency to a sprawling company that’s fallen behind the pace in recent years.
Most importantly, he’s attacking the chain’s pricing at a critical time. While many other grocers are trying to offer better promotions and shift the conversation around pricing and value, Foran is focused on building a faster, sleeker company.
In case you missed it
Trader Joe’s loses top spot in public image poll
The specialty grocer finished ninth in the 2026 Axios Harris Poll 100, ceding the No. 1 spot in the annual corporate reputation rankings that it won last year to online pet product retailer Chewy. Costco held onto fifth place in the survey, while Kroger jumped eight places to No. 27, and Aldi moved up 13 spots to No. 19.
The poll reflects responses from 6,226 people collected from Dec. 15-22 and is designed “to understand the public’s top-of-mind awareness of companies that either excel or falter in society,” according to Axios.
T&T Supermarket sets opening date for inaugural Golden State store
The Canada-based Asian food retailer announced this week that its first location in California will hold its grand opening on June 18. The store, which is in San Jose’s Westgate Center, was originally slated to debut last fall, but T&T pushed back the opening timeline because of construction-related issues, KRON reported. T&T opened its first U.S. store in Bellevue, Washington, in December 2024.
“We’re exporting a new way of life from Canada: one that’s deeply food-centric, celebratory, rich in tradition, and fresh-obsessed,” T&T CEO Tina Lee said in a statement.
Kroger marks Memorial Day with gas savings
On Wednesday, the grocer began offering four times the regular number of fuel points to shoppers through Saturday, reprising a similar promotion it ran in late March and early April as gas prices spiked following the start of the war with Iran. Kroger is also promoting savings on products traditionally served at Memorial Day get-togethers, including ground beef, hot dogs, watermelon and baked beans.
Impulse find
These Hy-Vee employees just keep on truckin’
The Midwestern supermarket chain is making a unique tribute to numerous employees who have worked for the retailer for several decades: printing their photo on the side of one of the company’s semi-trailers.
Dawn Hilderbrand, a worker at a Hy-Vee location in West Des Moines, Iowa, whose likeness now graces a Hy-Vee vehicle, summed up her reaction to seeing her face on a Hy-Vee vehicle in an interview with KCCI 8 News outside the store where she works.
“I just think it’s a great thing they do for us that have been around this long,” said Hilderbrand, whose tenure with Hy-Vee spans more than 45 years. “You don’t see that very often in the companies nowadays, so I just think it’s awesome.”
A pair of longtime workers at a Hy-Vee in Columbia, Missouri, can also see their faces roll down the road. They include Roy Fullington, who started as a driver for a Hy-Vee subsidiary in 1980 and later managed the Columbia store’s seasonal lawn and garden center, and Wayne Werkmeister, a more than 50-year company veteran who managed one of the stores’ Starbucks locations, the Columbia Daily Tribune reported. Fullington and Werkmeister both transitioned to part-time work in 2025.
Hy-Vee is also honoring Bill Baker, a dairy manager at a Hy-Vee in Washington, Iowa, the Southeast Iowa Union reported. Baker began working at that store in 1978, when he was 16, according to the newspaper.
Hy-Vee’s semi-trailers have been featuring workers who have been with the company for extended periods since 1997, according to KCCI.
