It's a fight for survival against Wal-Mart........................................................
Grocer scales back its payroll
By Barry Shlachter
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
October 9, 2004
Thousands of full-time Albertsons employees in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma are being switched to part-time status in a move apparently designed to make the company more competitive with Wal-Mart, now North Texas' No. 1 grocer.
Spokeswoman Jennifer Vroman declined to say how many employees are affected in the three-state division, which has its headquarters in Fort Worth and employs 20,000.
The conversions will better position staff during peak shopping hours and make the division more closely conform to the full-time/part-time ratio of employees elsewhere in the Boise, Idaho-based company. Albertsons is the country's second-largest supermarket chain after Kroger with about 2,500 stores.
"In Dallas, we did have a large percentage of full-time employees" compared with other Albertsons divisions, Vroman said. The process began in February and included attrition to thin the ranks of full-time staff, she said Friday.
Employees converted to part-time status will lose company-subsidized health care coverage but can keep medical insurance at their own expense, Vroman said. An employee is considered full-time with 30 hours or more per week, she said.
Albertsons was the No. 1 food retailer in Fort Worth and Dallas three years ago. Even then, the region was among the nation's most competitive retail food markets -- before Wal-Mart sharply expanded its steep-discount supercenters and limited assortment, neighborhood stores.
Today, Wal-Mart Supercenters rank at the top in both markets, with Albertsons second in Fort Worth and third in Dallas behind Safeway-owned Tom Thumb, according to the October issue of the Shelby Report of the Southwest, a monthly that tracks the industry.
The removal of a division president along with considerable outlays for remodeling and self-checkout scanners apparently haven't gone far enough to improve the chain's competitive picture locally.
A prolonged lockout of union workers in California by major chains including Albertsons also proved costly.
Judy Spires, the new division president, made clear in an internal TV message to employees in July that switching workers from eight-hour shifts to four or six hours was part of "our fight for survival in this division."
A videotape of her talk was obtained by the Texarkana Gazette. Vroman confirmed the tape's authenticity.
"We are in a do-or-die situation," the paper quoted Spires as saying.
In Boise, a spokesman for the United Food and Commercial Workers union questioned the necessity for conversions in the Fort Worth division.
The union represents 120,000 Albertsons employees, but not those in Texas, where the company's distribution workers are members of the Teamsters union.
"If you look at retailers like Albertsons, they are still profitable companies," the spokesman, Greg Denier, told The Idaho Statesman, a newspaper in Boise. "There's no need for desperation measures."
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Barry Shlachter, (817) 390-7818 bshlachter@star-telegram.com
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