page_title: Grand Union (supermarket)
section_title: 2001 acquisition by C&S Wholesale Grocers
hierarchical_section_title: Grand Union (supermarket) / History / 2001 acquisition by C&S Wholesale Grocers
caption_attribution_description: Former Grand Union in Bolton Landing, NY; now a Tops.
context_page_description: Grand Union Supermarkets, later known as Grand Union Family Markets and often referred to simply as Grand Union, was an American chain of grocery stores that did business primarily in the northeastern United States. It operated stores in other areas of the country including the midwestern and southeastern states, and internationally in the Caribbean and Canada. The company was founded and headquartered in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and moved to Brooklyn, New York in the early 20th century. Grand Union moved again to Elmwood Park, New Jersey and finally to Wayne, New Jersey before the company was forced into Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2001 and sold to C&S Wholesale Grocers.
  After C&S bought Grand Union it down-scaled most of its operations, keeping only a number of stores in upstate New York and New England open. The chain was sold to Tops Friendly Markets in 2012; in 2013 Tops rebranded the remaining Grand Union stores with the Tops logo and the Grand Union name was discontinued.
context_section_description: Grand Union's Chapter 7 filing had a large effect on its supplier C&S Wholesale Grocers, a New England-based wholesale food distributor of which Grand Union was its largest customer. C&S also was one of Grand Union's largest creditors, and made a stalking horse offer to take control of the company in early 2001 that was approved.
  Shortly afterward, C&S began reorganizing Grand Union's operations. This resulted in a consolidation that left the chain with only a relatively small number of stores in smaller cities and towns across Upstate New York and New England. In addition, Grand Union's stores in the Northeast, where it was long established, were closed. Many of the medium-sized and most of the larger Grand Union stores, as well as most of the construction permits for stores that had yet to be built or finished, were sold to Ahold while C&S continued to supply the stores. At the time of the acquisition of Grand Union by C&S, Ahold had been looking to establish a presence in the Northeast as well through its Edwards Super Food Stores chain and was initially a bidder for Grand Union. Eventually Ahold converted the Edwards stores to Stop & Shop, reintroducing the brand to the area, and later converted the Grand Union stores it acquired to Stop & Shops as well. Ahold began supplying Grand Union stores for some time prior to their rebranding. This meant that although the store retained the Grand Union sign on the outside and various other signage on the inside, it had Stop & Shop branded items on the shelves.
  Other supermarket chains that purchased Grand Union stores included Tops, which was at the time also an Ahold subsidiary, Shaw's, Hannaford, Price Chopper and Pathmark. Some of the other medium-sized stores were sold to department store chains such as Marshalls and Kohl's, while many of the smaller stores were sold to independent grocers and drugstore chains such as Eckerd, Rite Aid, CVS, and Walgreens. Other stores, like the former flagship in Elmwood Park, were demolished after closing and replaced with other buildings.
  As for the stores that remained under the Grand Union banner, they became part of a rebranded Grand Union Family Markets, complete with a new logo that discarded the 1980s "Red Dot" logo. Many of the stores did keep the Red Dot, although not all of them did.
caption: 2011 photo of a Grand Union store in Bolton Landing, NY; now a Tops
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