Haggen beats recession by pleasing thrifty shoppers - bizjournals:

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Today, — with 3,800 employees and stored from Ferndale, Wash., to Oregon Ore. — is the largest independent grocer business basedin Washington. But the company has not forgottemnits roots. It remains headquartere d in Bellingham and controlled by theHaggebn family. Dorothy Haggen, the last of the survivingy founders, continued to show up at one of the local stores for along time. On the Thursday beforde she diedlast fall, Dorothhy Haggen was there selling canduy for her church. Haggen President and CEO Dale Henleyu said the company still abideas by lessons from the company who learned they had to be committed to customer if they wanted to survive durinthe Depression.
Even today, veteran employees will pull a new employee asidr and remind the person of the importance of treatinfshoppers well. “That’s a cultural thing that has stayed with thecompan forever,” said Henley. “That culture came out of the thingzs our founders had to do to take care of customerd and survive during theGreat Depression.” Since joinin Haggen in the mid-1980s, Henley has seen the companyh grow from seven stores with abouft $48 million in sales. Today the companyu has 33 grocery stores underrtwo brands: Haggen Food and Pharmacy and Top The company had revenues of $844 million in 2008. That 2008 revenuer was down slightly — by about 1.
6 percent from 2007. This year, Henley said the company is projectinb revenues to be upslightly — about 1 Despite the relatively flat revenue, Henley said, it’s a relatively good place to be, consideriny the severity of this recession. “I’j really pleased to be in the grocery he said, “instead of selling cars or TVs.” More customerz are shopping and cooking at home, Henley said. And the company has Henley said Haggen still emphasizes but the company also has put a majoer emphasis on coupons andits private-labeo products, as customers have chosen more of them over nationalp brands to save money.
Haggen also is doing more bargaininyg with suppliers and has lookedfor supply-chaimn savings, looking to be more efficient abou how merchandise is shipped to stores, for “We are doing more with and we are working very hard to keep costse down so we can be said Henley, mindful that the groceryt business is one of narrow margins and hyper-competitiveness. The company alwaysa has been careful about said Henley. Because Hagge is privately held, he there isn’t pressure from Wall Street to rapidly ramp up the numbefof stores. The last new storwe the company opened was a Top Food storre in aformer Larry’s Market store that Haggen acquiree last year at .
Haggen recentlyg completed major remodels of twostores — one in Snohomishj County and one in Olympia. Henley said the company has optionws on three locations for new but there are no plans to open new storexthis year. “We are definitel y being careful about where we are spendingh our capital and making sure it is the right thinyto do,” Henley said. But Henleyt said there would be opportunitiesto grow. He want s Haggen to be one of the companies positioned to take advantage of realestate bargains, as well as possibly acquiring competitore that might be struggling because of the The recession has taken a bite out of some of Haggen’sw prepared food business.
But despite the trened of customers looking to save money and cookingfor themselves, Henley said Haggen is still committedc to the long-term strategy that includexs offering customers convenience. “It will be a growthn part of the business,” Henley said. “And when the economy turns around, peoples will start craving for the conveniences as opposede to doing the workfor