Can anyone tell me about SavMax Foods? I had never heard of them before today, apparently they are/were a Sacramento-based chain of "warehouse" supermarket, similar to FoodMax and Food4Less. I have traveled around No. Cal. and am of course a regular reader of this and other retail history boards, but I have never heard of or seen them.
Who owns/owned them? Are they independent? Are they just FoodMax by another name?
SavMax Foods
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storewanderer
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Sav Max was originally Food 4 Less of Modesto. They were at some point purchased by Certified Grocers, maybe 1997. I'm not sure when they rebranded from F4L to SMX. CerGro attempted to expand the format with locations in Sacramento, Orland, Oroville, North Highlands, some central valley town other than Modesto, maybe Turlock. Certified merged with United to form Unified. Certified also bought some surplus stores from Albertsons/Lucky in 1999, mostly in SoCal, with the idea to supply them but have independent opreators run them. This did not work out in all cases, so Unified decided to brand those stores (which were conventional) that they were stuck operating in SoCal as Sav Max. Locations included Apple Valley, Costa Mesa (which was a former Vons as Vons took maybe two year old Albertsons while Albertsons took a brand new Lucky), and some other places. They did not last long at all.
In maybe 2002 they closed the NorCal Stores with the exception of that one forgotten central valley town that I think is Turlock and the location on Norwood in Sacramento. Orland may not have lasted that long. Sometime between then and 2005, the Norwood location was closed as well. Norwood has since been reopened and is branded "SavCo" with a very similar looking logo to SavMax, with the interior mainly untouched. Ironically SavCo is supplied by C&S, not Unified.
In maybe 2002 they closed the NorCal Stores with the exception of that one forgotten central valley town that I think is Turlock and the location on Norwood in Sacramento. Orland may not have lasted that long. Sometime between then and 2005, the Norwood location was closed as well. Norwood has since been reopened and is branded "SavCo" with a very similar looking logo to SavMax, with the interior mainly untouched. Ironically SavCo is supplied by C&S, not Unified.