Top Retailers

NEW YORK — Deutsche Bank on Thursday speculated that either Cerberus or Kroger could acquire Safeway. 

The firm noted that divestitures in a Kroger acquisition would exceed those in a Cerberus buyout.  

A Bloomberg report published last week suggested Cerberus was the lead bidder for Safeway's operations. 

CINCINNATI — Kroger on Thursday announced that its total active work force has grown by more than 7,000 during fiscal year 2013. Approximately 90% of the new jobs are in the company's supermarket divisions.

NEW YORK — Sam's Club is piloting a new online subscription service — My Subscriptions — that allows consumers to automatically replenish consumables like diapers or printer cartridges, The Wall Street Journal's Market Watch reported Wednesday. 

ZAANDAM, The Netherlands — Ahold announced plans to significantly expand its Peapod presence in the U.S. market when announcing fourth-quarter results on Thursday. "Peapod is expected to double its capacity in the U.S. in 2014," Dick Boer, Ahold CEO, told analysts. 

MINNEAPOLIS — Target announced on Wednesday a decline in fourth-quarter sales and earnings; however, executives expressed optimism as they plan for the new fiscal year and work to restore consumer confidence following the data breach.

SAN FRANCISCO — UC-San Francisco and Walgreens on Tuesday opened a Walgreens store on the UCSF campus that aims to improve medication safety, decrease healthcare costs and help patients use medicines more effectively by offering pharmacist-based patient care and expanded health-and-wellness services to the community. A joint effort among Walgreens, the UCSF School of Pharmacy and UCSF Medical Center, “Walgreens at UCSF” also will explore new models for improving overall patient care.

BOISE, Idaho — AB Acquisition LLC, which operates Albertson’s LLC and New Albertson’s Inc., has appointed Rick Navarro, who had been the company’s CFO since its inception in 2006, as chief administrative officer. Succeeding Navarro as the company’s CFO is former Nash Finch executive Robert Dimond.

In his new role, Navarro will oversee the IT, legal, business development, human resources and public affairs functions.

ORLANDO, Fla. — Healtheway on Monday announced the formation of Carequality, a new initiative dedicated to accelerating progress in health data exchange among multiplatform networks, healthcare providers, electronic health record vendors and health information exchange vendors. Carequality is an open, transparent and inclusive industry-driven effort. It will convene stakeholders and facilitate industry consensus to develop and maintain a standards-based interoperability framework that enables information exchange between and among networks.