Smith's Food and Drug, or simply Smith's, is an American regional supermarket chain that was founded by Lorenzo Smith in 1911 in

Brigham City, Utah Brigham City is a city in Box Elder County, Utah, Box Elder County, Utah, United States. The population was 19,650 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, up from the 2010 figure of 17,899. It is the county seat of Box Elder County. It l ...

. Headquartered in

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...

with stores in

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

Montana Montana ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota to the east, South Dakota to the southeast, Wyoming to the south, an ...

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest and Mountain states, Mountain West subregions of the Western United States. It borders Montana and Wyoming to the east, Nevada and Utah to the south, and Washington (state), ...

, and

Wyoming Wyoming ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States, Western United States. It borders Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho t ...

, Smith's became a subsidiary of

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 Cinc ...

in 1998.

History

Beginning

Smith's Food & Drug began in 1911 when Lorenzo Smith opened a small dry goods store in

. It was replaced with a larger store across the street in 1922 and renamed "Smith & Son's Market" in 1932. When his son Dee Glen Smith joined the business after serving in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, he began immediately expanding it. The company's growth ramped up exponentially from 1946 to 1958. It changed its name to Smith's Super Market in 1952. When Dee Smith took over as president upon his father's death in 1958, he determined Brigham City was saturated, and felt the only option was to expand to other markets. Through partnerships and acquisitions, Dee Smith built the company until his death at age 58 in 1984. After his death, his eldest son Fred Smith, ran the chain until later, when his brother Jeff Smith became the chairman and CEO of Smith's. In 1989, the company completed its

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investm ...

and shares of the company started trading on the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is the List of stock exchanges, largest stock excha ...

. In 1996, Smith's acquired the Arizona supermarket chain Smitty's Supermarkets.

Acquisitions

Fred Meyer

In 1997, Smith's Food & Drug was acquired by

Portland Portland most commonly refers to: *Portland, Oregon, the most populous city in the U.S. state of Oregon *Portland, Maine, the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maine *Isle of Portland, a tied island in the English Channel Portland may also r ...

-based

Fred Meyer Fred Meyer, Inc. is an American chain of hypermarket superstores and subsidiary of Kroger based in Portland, Oregon. The stores operate in the northwestern United States, with locations in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Alaska. The company was ...

for about $700 million (equivalent to $ billion in ) in stock. The deal created a supermarket and general merchandise chain with 374 stores in 17 western states. Under the terms of the agreement, Smith's shareholders received 1.05 shares of Fred Meyer

common stock Common stock is a form of corporate equity ownership, a type of security. The terms voting share and ordinary share are also used frequently outside of the United States. They are known as equity shares or ordinary shares in the UK and other C ...

for each share of Smith's common stock, or about $45 a share. Fred Meyer also assumed $1.3 billion (equivalent to $ billion in ) in Smith's debt, which was accumulated largely from a

recapitalization Recapitalization is a type of corporate reorganization involving substantial change in a company's capital structure. Recapitalization may be motivated by a number of reasons. Usually, the large part of equity is replaced with debt or vice versa. ...

that was led by the

Yucaipa Companies The Yucaipa Companies, LLC is an American private equity firm founded in 1986 by Ronald Burkle. It specializes in a private equity and venture capital, with a focus on middle-market companies, growth capital, industry consolidation, leveraged ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

Kroger

In 1998, Fred Meyer was acquired by

in a deal that created a supermarket giant with $43 billion ($ billion in ) in annual revenue and 2,200 stores in 31 states. As a result of the Kroger–Fred Meyer merger, Smith's had immediately become a subsidiary of

and most Smith's Food & Drug Centers in Arizona were rebranded as

Fry's Food and Drug Fry, fries, Fry's or frying may refer to: Food and cooking * Frying, the cooking of food in hot oil or fat ** French fries, deep-fried potato strips ** Frying pan, cookware for frying People * Fry (surname), a British family name (including ...

. Kroger paid about $8 billion (equivalent to $ billion in ) in stock for Fred Meyer and assumed $4.8 billion (equivalent to $ billion in ) of the company's debt, further consolidating the grocery business and creating the largest supermarket chain in the country. With the transaction, Kroger regained the spot it lost to

Albertsons Albertsons Companies, Inc. is an American grocery company founded and headquartered in Boise, Idaho. With 2,253 stores as of the third quarter of fiscal year 2020 and 270,000 employees as of fiscal year 2019, the company is the second-large ...

as the nation's largest supplier of eggs and milk. The acquisition gave Kroger the status of the nation's largest supermarket company, stretching from the fast-growing

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

markets, where Portland-based Fred Meyer is strong, to the

Midwest The Midwestern United States (also referred to as the Midwest, the Heartland or the American Midwest) is one of the four census regions defined by the United States Census Bureau. It occupies the northern central part of the United States. It ...

and the

Southeast The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, Radius, radially arrayed compass directions (or Azimuth#In navigation, azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A ''compass rose'' is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, ...

, where the

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

-based company has many stores and much visibility. The move gave Kroger even greater purchasing power and substantial

economies of scale In microeconomics, economies of scale are the cost advantages that enterprises obtain due to their scale of operation, and are typically measured by the amount of Productivity, output produced per unit of cost (production cost). A decrease in ...

. Many of the products sold at Smith's are Kroger-branded.

Smith's Marketplace

In 2004, Kroger introduced a new store concept known as Marketplaces which served as medium-sized

department stores A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store under one roof, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store made ...

and sold clothing, household goods and often contained bank branches and a Fred Meyer Jewelers in addition to food and pharmacy sales. In April 2004, Kroger merged Fred Meyer's Utah operations into Smith's. Five Utah Fred Meyer stores were converted to the new Smith's Marketplace banner in June of that year. The other Utah Fred Meyer stores located in Ogden, West Valley City, and

Sandy Sandy may refer to: People and fictional characters *Sandy (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters with the given name or nickname * Sandy (surname), a list of people * Sandy (Iranian music band), Iranian singer, comp ...

were closed. Earlier, Fred Meyer had closed a full-service store located in

Orem Orem is a city in Utah County, Utah, United States, in the northern part of the state. It is adjacent to Provo, Lindon, and Vineyard and is approximately south of Salt Lake City. Orem is one of the principal cities of the Provo-Orem, Utah Me ...

that failed to meet expectations. On November 12, 2008, a new Smith's Marketplace store was opened in Lehi, Utah. The store is . In 2008, Smith's also remodeled the former Fred Meyer store located at 500 East and 500 South in Salt Lake City. That store in Downtown Salt Lake is the biggest location. On July 16, 2014, Smith's opened a new Smith's Marketplace in Los Alamos,

. In November 2014, Smith's opened up its seventh marketplace store in

North Ogden North Ogden is a city in Weber County, Utah, United States. The population was 20,916 at the 2020 census. North Ogden is on SR-235, three miles north of Ogden. It is a suburb of that city and is part of the Ogden- Clearfield, Utah Metropoli ...

. On December 3, 2014, Smith's opened up its eighth store in West Jordan,

, located off 7800 South and the

Mountain View Corridor The Mountain View Corridor is a freeway under construction in northern Utah that will run along the western periphery of Salt Lake County and south into northwest Utah County. Except for the last several miles on its southern end the Mountain ...

. Smith's opened its ninth Marketplace store in Kaysville,

in late 2015. Another Marketplace was opened in

South Jordan South Jordan is a city in south central Salt Lake County, Utah, United States, south of Salt Lake City. Part of the Salt Lake City metropolitan area, the city lies in the Salt Lake Valley along the banks of the Jordan River between the Oquirrh ...

late 2016, as well as another in Springville,

in April 2017. On June 13, 2018, Smith's opened its first Marketplace in northwest

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

. On January 29, 2022, they opened a Marketplace in

Henderson, Nevada Henderson is a city in Clark County, Nevada, United States, about southeast of downtown Las Vegas. It is the List of cities in Nevada, 2nd most populous city in Nevada, after Las Vegas, with 317,610 residents. The city is part of the Las Vegas V ...

Smith's Fuel Center and Smith's Express

Smith's operates various fuel centers across the northwest and southwest regions of the United States. These fuel centers consist of fuel pumps and kiosks that sell convenience merchandise. Smith's also operates shops known as Smith's Express that sell convenience merchandise and are accompanied with a fuel station.

Products

Smith's Food & Drug Centers offer a wide range of products from a wide range of brands. This includes Smith's banner products, Kroger banner products and products of Kroger private-label brands such as Simple Truth, Private Selection, Comforts, Abound, Luvsome, Bloom Haus, Murray's Cheese, Bakery Fresh Goodness, Dip, Home Chef, Pet Pride, OfficeWorks, HD Designs, and Everyday Living.

Smith's Rewards

Just like other Kroger-affiliated stores, Smith's offers a rewards program for both customers and associates where rewards members can: buy certain items at certain sale prices, get discounts on certain items, earn fuel points that can allow Rewards members to save on fuel at Smith's or other Kroger-affiliated fuel centers, etc. Smith's Rewards can be used at other Kroger-affiliated stores.

Sponsorships

Smith's has a current sponsorship with Primary Children's Hospital where Smith's provides donations to the hospital. Smith's also has sponsorships with sports organizations such as the

Utah Jazz The Utah Jazz are an American professional basketball team based in Salt Lake City. The Jazz compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Northwest Division of the Western Conference. Since the 1991–92 season, the ...

Utah Utes The Utah Utes are the college athletics in the United States, intercollegiate athletics teams that represent the University of Utah, located in Salt Lake City. The athletic department is named after the Ute tribe of Native Americans in the Unite ...

, and

Salt Lake Bees The Salt Lake Bees are a Minor League Baseball (MiLB) team that plays in the Pacific Coast League (PCL) and are the Triple-A affiliate of the Los Angeles Angels. Based in South Jordan, Utah, the team plays its home games at The Ballpark at Am ...

Visa credit cards

In early April 2019, Smith's Food & Drug had stopped accepting

Visa Visa most commonly refers to: * Travel visa, a document that allows entry to a foreign country * Visa Inc., a US multinational financial and payment cards company ** Visa Debit card issued by the above company ** Visa Electron, a debit card ** Vi ...

credit cards, describing the fees as excessive. Smith's Food & Drug started to accept Visa credit cards again in late October 2019.

References

External links

*
Kroger
(official website)
Funding Universe: Smith's history
{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith's Food And Drug 1911 establishments in Utah Brigham City, Utah Companies based in Salt Lake City Economy of the Northwestern United States Economy of the Southwestern United States Kroger Retail companies established in 1911 Supermarkets of the United States 1998 mergers and acquisitions