Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
At the time of this post, Kroger stock was $55.15. See https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/KR/,
| Current | 5/31/2024 | 1/31/2024 | 10/31/2023 | 7/31/2023 | 5/31/2023 | |
| Market Cap | 39.49B | 37.81B | 33.19B | 32.64B | 34.91B | 32.55B |
| Enterprise Value | 54.99B | 53.96B | 50.11B | 48.90B | 51.59B | 50.82B |
| Trailing P/E | 14.30 | 17.69 | 17.95 | 20.25 | 13.98 | 14.81 |
| Forward P/E | 12.27 | 11.76 | 10.73 | 10.14 | 10.79 | 10.13 |
| PEG Ratio (5yr expected) | 1.33 | 1.28 | 1.75 | 1.64 | 1.71 | 1.60 |
| Price/Sales | 0.26 | 0.25 | 0.23 | 0.22 | 0.24 | 0.22 |
| Price/Book | 3.16 | 3.26 | 2.96 | 3.07 | 3.20 | 3.24 |
| Enterprise Value/Revenue | 0.37 | 0.36 | 0.34 | 0.33 | 0.35 | 0.34 |
| Enterprise Value/EBITDA | 7.06 | 7.68 | 7.48 | 7.69 | 6.88 | 7.24 |
When you walk into a local grocery store, you may see pictures of the heads of the departments on the wall. There is a pretty good chance that the people pictured on the wall started as a bagger, cashier, or stocker. They bagged customer groceries. They rang up customer orders. They restocked the bread shelves. They brought baskets into the lobby. Over time, they learned other aspects of the store. Eventually, they made their way to a management position. There is a lot of pride in this. In addition to tapping your resources within, you want to look out as well. Just recently, Kroger help stock food at a pantry at a local community college. See Southwest, Kroger partner to open The Pantry for campus students. There is also a Retail Management Certificate Program at the local community college as well. This can serve as one avenue for recruiting. Also, tuition assistance programs may be available. This information could be obtained from a company bulletin board or website.
In 2022, the average employee turnover rate in the grocery store industry was 48%. See https://www.supermarketperimeter.com/articles/9003-retailers-suppliers-continue-to-struggle-to-get-and-keep-high-quality-workers. Why is that? The starting age to work in a grocery store may be 15/16 years with limited hours due to school. The young person is building their work history so they will not stay for an extended period. College kids may work in the store over the summer or holiday breaks to build up some money before they leave for school. If they were a good worker, they may be able to pick that job back up at the end of the academic school year. And life happens. You may start out working there and things happen, and you must leave the job for whatever reason. We are humans first. We have a lot of personalities. You will not like every person that you meet. It takes a lot to deal with the public, the pay may not be great, and the worker may feel unappreciated. According to a 2017 exit survey, an employee stated “A pay increase that’s more than 25 cents a year, inflation is driving costs up and pay scale isn’t keeping up. People 10 years with the company on food stamps doesn’t seem right.” See https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/56873/000121465922007247/r519220px14a6g.htm. There are approximately 420,000 people employed (full and part-time) with Kroger. Over half of these people are employed with Kroger full time. Once onboard, management must engage and retain them. If not, poor morale will be put on display, production levels will fluctuate, and sales will suffer.et
Next blog post will touch on creating and sustaining competitive advantages.
