This year Food City is proud to be celebrating their 100^th Anniversary.   The retail supermarket chain is well known for their low prices, exceptional customer service and extensive community involvement.

 

“Food City is extremely proud to be a local, family owned company.  Our heritage dates  back 100 years.  While the Smith Family entered the grocery business in 1955, the Food City chain we purchased in 1984 dates back to 1918, when the Humphrey’s Family opened their first supermarket in Greeneville, TN,” says Steven C. Smith, Food City president and chief executive officer. 

 

Company founder, Jack C. Smith, along with his father Curtis, cousin Ernest and uncle Earl  opened their first Piggly Wiggly store in Grundy, VA in 1955. The Smith Family went on to construct 3 additional locations, followed by the purchase of several smaller chain stores in 1974 and a joint venture that resulted in partial ownership of their first distribution center, Mid-Mountain Foods, Inc.  In 1984, Smith purchased Quality Foods, doubling the size of the company and opting to adopt Food City as the company banner. 

 

“As luck would have it, my grandmother sent my dad to the store one day.  It was just a little market with two checkouts and one of those was never open.  My dad got the groceries he needed and then had to stand in line for 45 minutes to check out.  When he came home, he told his family he thought he had found something to do,” says Smith.  “And the rest, as they say is history.” 

 

In 1989, Smith entered the Knoxville, TN market, again more than doubling the size of the company with the acquisition of 43 White Stores, followed by 11 Kennedy Piggly Wiggly locations and 6 Winn-Dixie supermarkets in the 1990’s and 8 Knoxville area BI-LO supermarkets in 2006.  In 2015, the company entered the Chattanooga and North Georgia market areas with the purchase of 29 additional BI-LO locations.  The company has also incurred significant growth through the construction of new units throughout their market area, while aggressively remodeling and replacing existing locations as needed to best serve their customers.

 

The chain has been a market leader in a number of innovative concepts and technologies.  From their very first location, a modern Piggly Wiggly boasting new color-coded fixtures as opposed to the traditional white fixtures of that day to being among the first to establish their own distribution center, data warehouse and loyalty marketing programs to incorporating pharmacy and fuel centers in their retail supermarkets to today’s modern conveniences of curb-side pickup and home delivery. 

 

“The grocery industry has certainly seen its fair share of changes over the past 100 years.  From the days of groceries being stored behind the counter to self-service supermarkets, scanning registers, curbside pickup and now home delivery service – a lot has changed.  But one thing that has remained the same is our unwavering commitment to our customers, our associates and the communities we serve,” says Smith.

 

Over 13% of the company is owned by their associates through the company’s employee stock ownership plan.  Food City offers a wide variety of services and conveniences, including full service meat and seafood departments and in-house meat cutters to hand cut their premium line of meats, which include Certified Angus Beef.  Through their partnership with local farmers, Food City has purchased more than $53.7M in fresh produce from local growers over the past ten years. 

 

The company also supports countless community events and civic groups.  In the past ten years alone, Food City has contributed over $10.4M in support of local organizations and activities, $6.1M to area schools, more than $34.7M in product donations to local food banks.  Partnering with their customers, during the past ten years, the retail supermarket chain has raised more than $3.9M to benefit local hunger relief organizations through their annual Race Against Hunger campaign, over $911,500 for Paralyzed Veterans Association, more than $1.6M for Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and over $1.5M in funds to benefit area disaster relief efforts.  Additionally, the Food City Charitable Foundation has contributed over $1.56M to local not for profit organizations throughout the region.  Food City is also the longest running sponsor at Bristol Motor Speedway, serving as the title sponsor for the Food City 500 and Food City 300 NASCAR races, as well as a major corporate partner for several local athletic programs, including the University of Tennessee, East Tennessee State University, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and Emory and Henry College.  “We’re committed to the communities we serve and we believe in giving back and encouraging our associates to volunteer and take an active role within their community,” says Smith.

 

The retail supermarket chain has a number of exciting events planned throughout the year-long celebration.  The company recently announced plans to donate $100,000 in additional monies to charitable organizations throughout the region in the Food City 100^th Anniversary Charity Challenge.  They are also bringing back one of their most unique and successful promotions – the Food City $100,000 Treasure Hunt.  During the next several months, the Treasure Hunt Prize Team will hit the road to award big cash prizes to winners throughout their market area.  Visit their website at foodcity.com for details on these and many other exciting activities throughout the year.

 

“In today’s competitive market place, it’s very rare to see a company celebrating their 100th Anniversary.  Food City is extremely proud to have served our friends and neighbors for the past 100 years. We realize this would not be possible without the loyalty and support of our customers, associates and our many great business partners.  Our company was founded on the simple philosophy to “run the best store in town”.  We’re still committed that mission today and we hope you’ll join us as we celebrate this incredible landmark in our company’s history.  Thank you for 100 remarkable years!,” says Smith.

 

Headquartered in Abingdon, Virginia, K-VA-T Food Stores (Food City’s parent company) operates 132 retail outlets throughout southeast Kentucky, southwest Virginia, east Tennessee, Chattanooga and north Georgia.  This includes 101 pharmacies, 100 fuel/convenience stores and 2 wine & spirits stores, as well as their own 1.2 million square-foot distribution center, located in Abingdon, VA.