SMART & FINAL AGREES TO SELL FLORIDA BUSINESS

LOS ANGELES -- Smart & Final here said it has signed a letter of intent to sell its Florida operations -- including food-service direct delivery and 14 stores -- to Gordon Food Service, Grand Rapids, Mich.

nt and capital resources on its core West Coast operations," Ross Roeder, chairman and chief executive officer, said. "Although our Florida business has great potential, it is critical in today's tough competitive environment to focus all our resources where they will provide the highest return possible."

The company did not pinpoint how much of last year's sales of $2 billion came from Florida.

According to Dan Gordon, GFS president and CEO, "Smart & Final's Florida businesses are a great fit with our existing operations and provide us a strategic entry into the Florida market, which historically has been one of the strongest food-service markets in the U.S."

Smart & Final's Florida operations encompass 14 stores, including six in Miami, a full-service distribution center in Miami, and a meat facility in Orlando. It entered the Florida market in 1995 when it acquired Henry Lee Co., Miami, and used that base to open non-membership warehouse stores there.

Gordon is a 106-year-old, family-owned-and-managed broadline food-service distributor serving more than 30,000 customers in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Pennsylvania and Ohio, plus Ontario and Quebec, Canada; it also operates 93 GFS Marketplace stores, similar to Smart & Final units, in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio.