QFI was a

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

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 founded in the late 1940s by John Musso. Originally, some QFI locations were leased, resulting in some stores being co-named with others (such as Lick Super Market). By the 1970s, when Musso's son Leo took over, all QFI stores were wholly owned and operated. QFI peaked as the number three grocery chain in the region, behind

Safeway Safeway is an American supermarket chain founded by Marion Barton Skaggs in April 1915 in American Falls, Idaho. The chain provides grocery items, food and general merchandise and features a variety of specialty departments, such as bakery, d ...

and Lucky, and had about 14 locations ranging from San Francisco south to Redwood City. In 1973, QFI was acquired by

Cala Foods Cala Foods was a supermarket chain operating in San Francisco, California. Cala Foods was the sister chain to Bell Markets. The last Cala Foods store closed its doors on December 1, 2011. History Cala Foods was established in 1947 by the seven ...

, which itself was acquired by

Ralphs Ralphs is an American supermarket chain in Southern California. The largest subsidiary of Cincinnati-based Kroger, it is the oldest such chain west of the Mississippi River. Kroger also operates stores under the Food 4 Less and Foods Co. names ...

(a subsidiary of Kroger) in the 1990s. In August 2006, Ralphs reached an agreement to sell 11 of 13 Cala Food and Bell Market stores back to Harley DeLano, previous manager of the Cala chain. In January 2007, DeLano Retail Partners took control of all but one Cala Foods Store and immediately rebranded the stores to DeLano's

IGA Iga may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Ambush at Iga Pass, a 1958 Japanese film * Iga no Kagemaru, Japanese manga series * Iga, a set of characters from the Japanese novel '' The Kouga Ninja Scrolls'' Biology * ''Iga'' (beetle), a gen ...

. In late 2010, it was announced that Delano's was struggling financially and that the majority of DeLano's IGA locations would be closing.

Previous Locations

Redwood City,

Millbrae Millbrae is a city located in northern San Mateo County, California, San Mateo County, California, United States. To its northeast is San Francisco International Airport, San Bruno, California, San Bruno is on its northwest, and Burlingame, Cal ...

South San Francisco South San Francisco is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, located on the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area. The city is colloquially known as "South City". The population was 66,105 at the 2020 census. ...

2 locations, San Mateo

References

Grocerteria profile: QFI
{{Supermarkets of the United States Defunct supermarkets of the United States Food and drink in the San Francisco Bay Area 1940s establishments in California Companies based in San Francisco Supermarkets based in California