As Haggen closes its doors, court approves sales agreement with Smart & Final
The deli counter and bakery at the Haggen Food & Pharmacy on West Verdugo Avenue in Burbank were dark already last week, along with the butcher counter, though there were still a few slabs of meat in the nearby cooler.
The signs outside promised “Everything must go” and counted down the days to the store’s last, which is Wednesday — its doors close as a Haggen store at 6 p.m.
When it opens again, it could be a Smart & Final Extra. The U.S. Bankruptcy Court of Delaware in Wilmington approved a deal between the companies on Tuesday for the sale of the Burbank store, but the agreement may not be finalized until early next week, a Smart & Final spokesman said.
“Smart & Final is excited about the potential of having the new Burbank location,” said Ronald Quintero, a spokesman for the Commerce-based chain, last week.
The location will offer bulk foods, organic and natural foods, oven-roasted chicken prepared in-store and an expanded fresh produce, meat and seafood selection, Quintero said. Earlier this month, the grocery chain acquired 28 other Haggen stores for $56 million, and it plans to rebrand all 32 of the newly acquired locations as Smart & Final Extra stores.
The court had been expected to decide this week whether to approve Haggen’s plan to part with 55 stores under agreements with several buyers, including more than 30 to Albertsons, for a combined sum of $47 million. It approved the agreements for the sale of 47 stores on Tuesday.
Among them was the Burbank Haggen store, which is slightly more than a mile from an existing 15,000-square-foot Smart & Final located at 3708 W. Burbank Blvd., where in contrast to the dismal scene at the Verdugo Avenue grocery store, shelves were jammed with goods last week.
Extra stock was stacked above the shelves at the Smart & Final, and, in some cases, piled into grocery carts that lined the hallway near the bathrooms. Cashiers were ringing up conveyor belts filled with groceries.
Meanwhile, it’s not clear what will happen to the employees of the former Haggen store, many of whom had worked at the site when it was an Albertsons before the chain sold 146 Albertsons, Vons, Pavilions and Safeway stores throughout the northwest and southwest to Haggen earlier this year in order to gain government approval to merge with Safeway.
Bellingham, Wash.-based Haggen had been a small Pacific Northwest chain until it took over the additional stores and has had a rocky go throughout the Southwest. Haggen officials announced the company’s withdrawal from the region in September, along with plans to shed nearly all of its recently acquired stores as part of a bankruptcy filing.
That month, the Federal Trade Commission decided to allow Albertsons to rehire some of the Haggen employees.
Nicky Graham, the Burbank store’s director, said the employees at the store are a family and the closure is “just very personal for all of us right now.” However, she said she was not authorized to speak about the status of other employees.
Graham worked at the location under other names — Lucky and Albertsons — and she was on hand when it opened under the Haggen banner for the first time 209 days ago. However, she said she won’t be going back to Albertsons. She said Tuesday she didn’t yet have her next job lined up.
“I have nothing right now,” she said.
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Chad Garland, chad.garland@latimes.com
Twitter: @chadgarland
