Jewel Osco dazzles Tampa with sparkling new format

Drug Store News, April 3, 1989 by James Frederick

Jewel Osco dazzles Tampa with sparkling new format

LARGO, Fla. - Five years in the making, the first prototype of American Stores' new Jewel Osco superstore opened with a bang here, drawing mobs of shoppers and prompting excited comments from company officials.

West of Tampa, in the most densely populated part of western Florida, the 75,000-square-foot Jewel Osco offers 80,000 SKUs of food, drug and general merchandise. It's opening marks a breakthrough for American Stores on several different levels.

First, it heralds the company's re-entry into the Southeast after an absence of two decades. The chain will open two more of the giant combos this year in the Tampa Bay area, including a second unit tentatively set for a July 27 opening in North Pinellas, a suburb of Clearwater, and a third store in mid-November in New Port Richie, up the coast from Clearwater.

"We had no stores in the Southeast," said Mark Skaggs, president of the Florida division and son of American Stores founder and board chairman L.S. "Sam" Skaggs. "Florida is an area we were in before with Skaggs/Albertson's combos, before we dissolved that partnership, and we've always been looking to return. I think the state is ready for us."

Skaggs said in an interview with Drug Store News that the new Florida venture comprises "a major part of the expansion strategy" for American Stores.

Second, the opening culminates five years of planning and execution by an entirely new division of the company, Jewel Osco of Florida, to develop a combo store prototype specifically for the Florida market. Skaggs took over as head of the division in January 1988, after working "in all levels of store management" with the company's Skaggs Alpha Beta group in Texas. His involvement with the planning for the new prototype goes back several years, however.

"This is a separate division of the company created to run the new Jewel Osco stores in Florida, and it isn't part of Jewel Food Stores or the Osco/American Drug Stores group," explained American Stores spokesman Troy D'Ambrosio. "In the Midwest, Jewel runs the food side of the combo stores and Osco runs the drug side, but this is different. The Florida stores will be under one manager, similar to the way Skaggs/Alpha Beta is run."

"We'll be like cousins, as two separate divisions," added Osco spokesman John Kromer.

The first Jewel Osco of Florida store also marks the creation of American Stores' first genuinely new combo store prototype in years. Local newspapers are reportedly calling it the largest supermarket in the state, and company executives describe it as "substantially different" from other Jewel/Osco stores in design.

The store features a striking, pastel color scheme - done in Florida peaches, pinks and mauves - and neon signing to highlight individual departments. "We gave it a little `Miami Vice' look to please Florida shoppers," Skaggs said. "It has lots of color, but with a real soft look."

The store features such amenities as a walk-in florist cooler, a one-hour photo lab and service departments for deli, meat and seafood. The pharmacy has been moved from the rear to the side wall in the new prototype, and is bordered by a large service cosmetics department and the liquor section. Skaggs described the opening day as "an excellent day for scripts," despite the pharmacy's location behind liquor.

"We're trying to accomplish the best visibility we can with the pharmacy, and in this store I think the liquor department may obscure it a little," he said. "When we open the second store, we're looking seriously at putting the pharmacy along the side wall at the very front of the store."

In general, the store features a larger mix of non-foods than previous American Stores combos, Skaggs said. Despite its one-stop shopping appeal, the store has no video rentals. "Next door and across the street from us are two of the biggest video stores in the country, and we don't feel the need to try and compete with them," said Skaggs. "We also don't want Phar-Mor beating our brains out with their cheap video rentals."

Skaggs describes the Tampa Bay market as intensely competitive. In addition to Phar-Mor, Jewel Osco will be up against Eckerd Drug in its home turf, as well as Walgreens, Publix and two other deep-discount drug chains: Freddy's and Joel & Jerry's, a local retailer.

PHOTO : Mark Skaggs (left), president of Jewel Osco, greets some American Stores top brass at prototype opening, including board member Leon Harmon and vice chairman Vic Lund. CEO Jonathan Scott was also present. At far right is board member Fenton Maynard, former president of Skaggs/Albertson's.

PHOTO : The second store in this format may place pharmacy near the front along a side wall. It is surrounded by cosmetics and liquor in the first store.