Safeway Inc. a Fortune 500 company, is North America's second largest supermarket chain after The Kroger Co., with, as of December 2010[update], 1,694 stores located throughout the western and central United States and western Canada. It also operates some stores in the Mid-Atlantic region of the Eastern Seaboard. The company is headquartered in Pleasanton, California. Supermarket News ranked Safeway No. 4 in the 2011 "Top 75 North American Food Retailers" based on 2010 fiscal year estimated sales of $41 billion. Based on 2009 revenue, Safeway is the 11th largest retailer in the United States. Safeway is a brand name used by several companies around the world:

 

In 1941, Marion B. Skaggs retired from the Safeway board of directors.

 

In 1947, the company's sales exceeded $1 billion for the first time. By 1951, total sales had reached nearly $1.5 billion. The company adopted the S logo in 1962, which it still uses.

 

In 1955, Robert A. Magowan became Chairman of the Board of Safeway. Magowan had married Charles Merrill's daughter, Doris. Magowan also assumed the title of President in 1956. He remained President until 1968, and a member of the board until 1978.

 

In 1959, Safeway opened its first store in the new state of Alaska, being the first major food retailer to enter the market. The company opened three stores in Anchorage and one in Fairbanks over the next several years. The store in downtown Fairbanks was built on the site of a red-light district, known as "The Line," which operated for close to a half century. Most of these stores were located in buildings constructed by Anchorage real estate developer Wally Hickel, who later became governor of Alaska and U.S. Secretary of the Interior.

 

Also in 1959, the firm also opened the first "Marina"-style store on the Marina in San Francisco. Numerous stores were opened in this style throughout the next decade. The company's New York operations were sold in 1961 to Finast. In 1963, Safeway again opened stores in Hawaii, having exited this market in 1934. In 1969, Safeway entered the Toronto market in Canada and the Houston market in Texas by organic opening of new stores, rather than by acquisition. The firm would ultimately fail in both these markets against entrenched competition.

 

In 1977, Safeway management instituted a program to fight the use of counterfeit $100 bills, by, among other things, telling employees that bills that lacked the words "In God We Trust" were counterfeit. Because Safeway had not sufficiently investigated the history of those words, it was unaware there were still a few bills without the phrase in circulation. Eventually, a hapless shopper was incorrectly reported to Oakland, California police as being a counterfeiter; he was arrested and strip-searched before Oakland police contacted the Treasury Department and realized the error. The 1981 jury verdict of joint and several liability for $45,000 against Safeway Stores and the City of Oakland was upheld in full by the Supreme Court of California on December 26, 1986. 

 

In 1979, Peter Magowan, son of Robert Magowan and grandson of Charles Merrill, was appointed Chairman and CEO of Safeway. Magowan would manage Safeway for the next 13 years - presiding over the dramatic decline of the firm in terms of store numbers/

 

1980s: Takeover and sell-offs

Following a hostile takeover bid from corporate raiders Herbert and Robert Haft, the chain was acquired by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) acting as a white knight in 1986. With the assistance of KKR, the company was taken private and assumed tremendous debt. To pay off this debt, the company began selling off a large number of its operating divisions.

 

The divested domestic divisions of Safeway proved to be poisoned chalices for almost all those who acquired them. Essentially every purchasing entity hit financial troubles and either went bankrupt or was later acquired. (Hy-Vee and Fareway are the exceptions with the locations they acquired, having made them work)

 

The international stores were more successful for their acquirers. UK stores, Safeway plc, were sold to Argyll Foods, which itself was ultimately absorbed by Morrisons in 2004. Safeway Australia was sold to the Australian-based Woolworths Limited in 1985.

 

In Southern California, Safeway sold its stores to Vons in exchange for a 30% interest in the company, pulling completely out of established markets like Los Angeles and San Diego, and diminishing operations in Fresno, Modesto, Stockton, and Sacramento. Save Mart Supermarkets purchased the few remaining Fresno Safeway stores in 1996.

 

Safeway's national presence was now reduced to several western states and Northern California, plus the Washington, D.C. area. Altogether, nearly half the 2,200 stores in the chain were sold.

 

Canada Safeway dominated the grocery store landscape in Western Canada in the 1970s and 1980s. For example, the company controlled 80 percent of the grocery market in Alberta in the 1970s. The government even accused Safeway of having a monopoly on the grocery store business, causing unnecessarily high food prices. A judicial inquiry restricted the number of stores Safeway could open, and forced the company to close or sell off some locations to competitors like IGA. Incidentally, while some IGA stores housed in old Safeways have operated successfully for decades, others ceased operation in recent years.

 

In October 1986, the Canadian Press reported Safeway Canada took an $8 million hit by closing a prime store at West Edmonton Mall, which was the world's largest shopping centre at that time. It was the fifth store Safeway had closed in west Edmonton. Among those former stores, one included the location at the former Centennial Village Mall, now Mayfield Common (the building sat vacant for years, before briefly housing Edmonton's first, but temporary Save-On-Foods in the early 1990s, as a much larger, permanent Save-On-Foods was being built up the parking lot; another former Safeway location in west Edmonton now houses a Rexall Pharmacy.

 

Safeway also opened other grocery stores under the Food Barn and Food for Less names in Alberta; and the Safeway Superstore name in British Columbia. Food Barn was similar to Safeway in terms of selection and prices, but the store itself resembled a warehouse the size of an average Safeway store. In the mid-1980s, Food for Less was launched in the Alberta cities of Edmonton and Calgary, as a big-box, discount food store chain meant to compete with Loblaws's Real Canadian Superstore, which had expanded to western Canada. 

 

Most Food for Less and Real Canadian Superstore locations were constructed within blocks of each other. Upon the Real Canadian Superstore's opening, Loblaws produced television commercials with an aggressive tone, taking direct aim at Safeway's higher prices. One ad featured a man holding a rolled up Safeway newspaper flyer, while promising viewers they would find lower prices at the Real Canadian Superstore. While prices at Food for Less were meant to compete with the Real Canadian Superstore's, and be lower than that of Safeway's, this wasn't always the case.

 

In late 1987, Safeway acquired the 26 Woodward's Food Floors, which operated in the western Canadian provinces of British Columbia (16 stores) and Alberta .These stores were later rebranded as Woodward's World of Food.

 

Safeway would close Food Barn or rebrand stores as Safeway before the decade was over.

 

The company was taken public again in 1990.

 

1990s and beyond

Safeway in 1663 Branham Lane, San Jose, CA 95118

 

In the late 1990s, Safeway began to again aggressively acquire regional chains, including Randall's Food Markets in Texas, Carrs in Alaska, and Dominick's in Illinois. In 1997, it exercised its option to acquire control of Vons in Southern California. (The buyout of Randall's marked Safeway's return to Texas ten years after the original stores in Houston were sold to AppleTree.)

 

In western Canada, shortly before the Woodward's retail chain was sold off to the Hudson's Bay Company, and then closed by HBC in 1993, Safeway rebranded Woodward's Food Floors and World of Food stores to Safeway stores, though the interior of some locations kept the World of Food decor for several years, before being renovated into full-fledged Safeways. The Woodward's brand name effectively vanished from the Canadian retail landscape as a result.

 

Canada Safeway had gained a notorious reputation for its high prices. To combat this, and losing its market share to competitors such as the Real Canadian Superstore, Safeway staged a successful publicity stunt that saw all of its stores closing for one day. 

 

They would reopen Wednesday, February 17, 1993 with Safeway loudly proclaiming its new commitment to having the lowest food prices.

 

A new marketing campaign took off, featuring the motif of large red arrows pointing downwards. Safeway took out full-page ads in newspapers, listing hundreds of products and their new, drastically lower prices. Television commercials started airing, featuring helicopters flying across communities, carrying the red arrows before releasing and dropping them into a Safeway parking lot. The ads actually starting airing a couple of weeks earlier, but they were shrouded with much more mystery and secrecy. The first batch of commercials made no reference to Safeway; they only consisted of dark shots of many helicopters flying around - almost resembling a war zone. There was no voice either - only the sound of flying helicopters. The commercials ended with a text message on the screen informing viewers that something big was happening soon.

 

Safeway's new commitment to lower prices ignited a price war between grocery stores, much to the delight of consumers, that lasted for several weeks. However, Safeway's prices slowly crept back up as months passed, and within a couple of years, the red arrow campaign was abandoned altogether, and once again, Safeway regained its reputation for high prices.

 

Safeway was also experiencing labor pains with its employees in Edmonton in the mid-1990s. The company even threatened to shut down its stores if it could not work out a deal with the union. Rival the Real Canadian Superstore even took out a full-page newspaper ad, offering to buy out Safeway if there was indeed such trouble. No deals were ever made between any of the parties. Eventually, Safeway workers walked off the job. The weeks-long strike had many Safeway customers shopping elsewhere, so they would not have to cross the picket line.

 

By the mid to late-1990s, Safeway would close or convert existing Food for Less stores in Alberta to Safeways. As the Food for Less stores were much larger than regular Safeways, the company either vacated the Food for Less location and moved to a new building blocks away; or shrunk the store as it was renovated into a Safeway and leased off the extra space to another retailer. In British Columbia, Safeway Superstores eventually just became Safeways, therefore ending confusion between Safeway Superstores and the competing Loblaws-owned Real Canadian Superstore.

 

In the late 1990s, the company launched its popular Safeway Club Card loyalty program. The company said the card would make it more convenient for customers to get discounts, instead of clipping coupons. However, months after the Club Card's launch, the company would start reissuing coupons, which puzzled customers, some of whom already suspected Safeway only launched the Club Card for marketing and tracking purposes.

 

In 2001, Safeway acquired the family-owned Genuardi's chain, with locations in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. Safeway also created the subsidiary Blackhawk Network, a prepaid and payments network, a card-based financial solutions company, and a provider of third-party prepaid cards.

 

In October 2003, a strike was called by members of the United Food and Commercial Workers at Vons stores in Southern California. The strike (and concurrent lockout at Albertsons and Ralphs) lasted until the end of February 2004.

 

In November 2006, speculation rolled around as the Chicago Sun-Times reported that Sears Holdings Corporation may buy Safeway. 

 

In 1999, the Safeway chain started to also sell gasoline at some of its new stores. In 2012, its Genuardi's chain in suburban Philadelphia was dissolved through a combination of store selloffs and closures. Giant acquired 15 of the chain's stores and had made an offer for a 16th, but the latter was instead sold to a local chain as part of an antitrust settlement. Weis also bought three Genuardi's locations. A number of unprofitable Genuardi's units also had closed in 2010 and 2011 as their leases expired. 

 

Earlier, Zagara's, a small chain of upscale, gourmet supermarkets started by Genuardi's in 1990 was also shuttered in 2000, immediately following their parent company's acquisition by Safeway. The only Genuardi's in the northern half of New Jersey was also closed soon after the merger with Safeway, and a location in Bensalem, Pennsylvania was sold to ShopRite in 2004. Genuardi's in Wilmington, Delaware were converted to the Safeway name in 2004 due to legal issues stemming from a union contract signed by the management of early Safeway stores in Delaware which closed in 1982. The current Safeway locations in Delaware are served by division offices in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area, where Safeway has long been the dominant grocer; however, the majority of Safeway stores operate in the Western United States, where the chain originated. The next closest remaining Safeway-owned stores to the Baltimore-Washington division are Randalls stores in Houston, Texas.

 

Supermarket chains

• Safeway Inc., in the U.S. and Canada

• Safeway (Australia) a defunct supermarket chain of the Australian company Woolworths Limited, formerly a subsidiary of the American company

• Safeway (UK), a defunct UK supermarket chain, which was formerly a subsidiary of the American chain, and was taken over by Wm Morrison Supermarkets in 2004. Most former Safeway stores now trade under the Morrisons fascia.

• Safeway Stores (Ireland), a Northern Ireland-based joint venture between the UK Safeway plc and Fitzwilton Group, now part of Asda.

 

Insurance companies

• Safeway Insurance Group, a privately held Insurance company in the United States

 

QA：

• Can I have my prescriptions delivered to me 

• You can have your prescriptions delivered when you have an existing order for groceries scheduled for delivery. You must have a current prescription at a Safeway Pharmacy. You can order your prescriptions from 2 different locations: 1) from the order confirmation page, or 2) if you have an order already placed that is scheduled for a future day delivery, go to Order History and click Update Order. From there select Add Prescription Refills and follow the instructions. 

• Can I transfer my prescriptions online 

• Yes. From the home page, select the Pharmacy tab. In the left-hand navigation bar select the Refill or Transfer for Pickup link and follow the instructions to transfer your prescriptions online.