Big Challenges for Landlords Seeking Grocers

COVINA, CA—Stater Bros. Supermarket has signed a 15-year lease for a 42,000-square-foot anchor space at Grand-Covina Plaza, a shopping center in Covina, CA. The anchor location has remained vacant for the past two years after Albertsons, the former anchor tenant, vacated. The lease value was not disclosed.

The landlord has sought a grocer to fill the space since Albertson’s left, but found it difficult to find a traditional grocery tenant. Many traditional grocers are being hit by the changing retail landscape. “Stater Bros. is one of the few, what I would call, full-line grocers that is in an expansion mode now,” Terry Bortnick, Argent Retail Advisors founder, tells GlobeSt.com. Bortnick represented the landlord in the transaction. “Ralphs has not been opening new stores, Albertsons is in a store liquidation and Safeway is now in the process of being hired by Cerberus. The only full-line, Southern California, credit grocery store that is doing deals is Stater Brothers,” he adds.