Carter's Foods, more commonly known as Carter's, was an employee-owned

supermarket A supermarket is a self-service Retail#Types of outlets, shop offering a wide variety of food, Drink, beverages and Household goods, household products, organized into sections. This kind of store is larger and has a wider selection than earli ...

chain based in

Charlotte, Michigan Charlotte ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 9,074. It is the county seat of Eaton County. Charlotte is in the central portion of the county, on the boundary between Eaton Township and C ...

, United States. Founded in 1952, Carter's grew to over 30 stores throughout Michigan's

Lower Peninsula The Lower Peninsula of Michigan – also known as Lower Michigan – is the larger, southern and less elevated of the two major landmasses that make up the U.S. state of Michigan; the other being the Upper Peninsula, which is separated by the S ...

, including two in Charlotte. In 2006, the chain declared bankruptcy, with its remaining stores being closed or sold. Until the chain's demise, Carter's Foods was the only grocery chain in Michigan to be entirely owned by its employees.

History

Carter's Foods was founded in 1952 by Theodore Carter.WZZM 13 - Grocer Carter's closes all 14 stores - Charlotte-based company files for bankruptcy
/ref> A native of Charlotte, Michigan, Theodore had been an employee of the

Kroger The Kroger Company, or simply Kroger, is an American retail company that operates (either directly or through its subsidiaries) supermarkets and multi-department stores throughout the United States. Founded by Bernard Kroger in 1883 in Cinci ...

store in his hometown.Carter's Foods history
(

Internet Wayback Machine The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and see ...

archive) Carter's expanded over several decades, mainly by acquiring IGA store. IGA also was the primary supplier for Carter's. In 1999, Sperry and Hutchinson, a company known for its

S&H Green Stamps S&H Green Stamps was a line of trading stamps popular in the United States from 1896 until the late 1980s. They were distributed as part of a rewards program operated by the Sperry & Hutchinson company (S&H), founded in 1896 by Thomas Sperry a ...

, introduced an updated rewards program, S&H Greenpoints; Carter's was the first chain in Michigan to utilize Greenpoints. In 2000, Carter's Foods became 100 percent employee-owned, becoming the only supermarket chain in Michigan to be employee-owned. Citing competition from

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

and regional

supercenter A big-box store (also hyperstore, supercenter, superstore, or megastore) is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain of stores. The term sometimes also refers, by extension, to the company that operates the store. The te ...

chain

Meijer Meijer Inc. (, ; stylized as meijer) is an American supercenter chain that primarily operates throughout the Midwest. Its corporate headquarters are in Walker, Michigan, which is a part of the Grand Rapids metropolitan area. Founded in 1934 ...

, Carter's filed for Chapter 7

bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor ...

in 2006, after it was unable to pay several million dollars in debts to its suppliers.Traverse City ''Record-Eagle'': Carter's files for Chapter 7 bankruptcy
/ref> The last Carter's stores closed in mid-2006. Several were reverted to IGA or sold to

Spartan Stores SpartanNash (formerly Spartan Stores, Nash Finch) is an American food distributor and grocery store retailer headquartered in Byron Center, Michigan. The company's core businesses include distributing food to independent grocers, military co ...

,Oscoda ''Press'': "Court OKs sale of Carter’s stores"
/ref> while the remainder were shuttered.

References

{{Supermarkets of the United States Retail companies established in 1952 Retail companies disestablished in 2006 Defunct supermarkets of the United States Defunct companies based in Michigan Eaton County, Michigan Companies that have filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy Employee-owned companies of the United States 1952 establishments in Michigan 2006 disestablishments in Michigan