Shelly Banjo, Columnist

Kroger Will Save the Grocery Store

The chain bucks all the bad retail and grocery trends.

December 3, 2015 at 4:55 PM UTC

Shelly Banjo leads the global business team for Bloomberg News in New York. A former New York bureau chief and senior tech writer, she’s covered business, finance and economics for two decades.

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Retail is in the doldrums. Grocery chains are filing for bankruptcy. Former industry darlings like Whole Foods are struggling to boost sales. Amazon is making a big bet on online grocery delivery. Drugstore chains are selling boatloads of food. And for the first time ever, more people are eating out at restaurants than making food at home.

Sound like a recipe for disaster? Not for Kroger, the grocery chain that has been quietly growing its empire to become the second-largest U.S. retailer by sales after almighty Walmart, which derives 56 percent of its sales from groceries.