Cub Foods

Cub Foods is a grocery store chain with eighty-four stores in Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Ohio. The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Eden Prairie, Minnesota-based Supervalu. The store was famous for being "no frills; sack your own groceries..."

History

Beginnings

Cub Foods was founded by Adam Hooley's Minnesota-based Hooleys Supermarkets. 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. The chain was bought by Minnesota-based Supervalu in 1980 with five stores in the Twin Cities. After the purchase, the chain expanded to eighty-three stores, in three states. Up until 1999, WinCo Foods operated several Cub Foods stores. Cub Foods also operated 8 stores in Colorado up until 2003 when they sold most of their stores to Kroger. The chain also had locations in parts of the Southern United States, namely in the Atlanta and Nashville areas in the 1990s.

Cub Foods operated two stores in Columbus, Ohio until May 23, 1997 at which point both stores and its employees were acquired by Kroger. The only former Cub that remains as a Kroger is the store at Columbus Square.

Effects from Albertsons merger

As part of Supervalu's acquisition of 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. 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. The last of the Chicagoland Cub Foods Stores closed on December 10, 2006. A majority of them were sold to Central Grocers Cooperative and are operated as Strack and Van Til and Ultra Foods by a wholly-owned unit of the cooperative, and as Garden Fresh Markets by one of its members; others were sold to Grand Mart International Foods.

Former Slogans

(Incomplete List)

• "Great Food, Great Prices"
• "Save More, Get More"
• "I ♥ My Cub" (Made a brief return as a promotion for CUB's 40th birthday)
• "The Store Next door"
• "Bring more to your table"

Food safety

In November of 2000, an outbreak of H7 that sickened 40 people in the Midwest was traced to Cub Foods. The original source of the meat was found to be American Food Group, a meat packer in Green Bay, Wisconsin, although American Food Group disputed that it was responsible, claiming instead that Supervalu was at fault. Cub Foods was also linked to outbreaks of E. coli in Illinois 1998 and Minnesota in January of 2000. American Foods Group was allegedly the source of these outbreaks as well.

References

External links

• Official Cub Foods site
• SuperValu Cub Foods Corporate Site