PRICE CUTTER/RAMEY ENTERS ST. LOUIS

DON YAEGER

ST. LOUIS -- Price Cutter/Ramey, a 30-unit chain based in Springfield, Mo., has entered the St. Louis market.

The company bought a 63,000-square-foot Price Chopper super warehouse store here from the unit's supplier, Associated Wholesale Grocers, Kansas City, Kan. Observers said they expect Price Cutter/Ramey to buy six other area Price Choppers from AWG after the wholesaler purchases them from Warehouse Foods here, an independent that is going out of business. Officials of AWG and Price Cutter/Ramey declined to comment on the transactions.

Warehouse Foods owners Nick Sida and Joe Markovitz told employees in a recent letter that the company expects to close its stores and complete the sale to AWG, its supplier, about Nov. 14. "As many of you know, our financial situation has been deteriorating," the letter began. It said AWG would be looking for a supermarket operator to buy the Price Chopper stores. Sida and Markovitz could not be reached for comment.

Price Chopper is AWG's franchised super warehouse store format. The stores are a powerhouse in Kansas City, comprising more than one-third of the market. Most are built from the ground up, and all are owned by independents. The St. Louis Price Choppers, formerly Wetterau-franchised Shop 'N Save warehouse units served by that wholesaler, have barely made a dent in this market. They have been supplied by AWG since 1989. Most are in buildings formerly occupied by other supermarkets.

In entering St. Louis, Price Cutter/Ramey, which previously had confined expansion to southwestern Missouri, will face strong competition from local chains -- especially Schnuck Markets, which, after its recent acquisition of National Super Markets here, holds better than a 50% share of the market.