WEGMANS ADDS PL HBC

DAN ALAIMO

ROCHESTER, N.Y. -- Wegmans Food Markets here is adding a new private-label line of health and beauty care products from the Topco Associates cooperative based in Skokie, Ill.

"Our objective is to be your one-stop shop for health and beauty care, so you don't have to stop by a drug store or a mass merchant to get what you need," Mary Ellen Burris, director of consumer affairs, wrote in a recent online column. Wegmans executives declined to comment to SN on this story.

The rollout started last summer and will be completed by the end of the year, said Curtis Maki, vice president, program management, HBC/GM/Rx, at Topco. He estimated that Wegmans eventually will carry 400 of the Top Care products.

"They are promoting it as a national-brand equivalent, not as a value line," Maki told SN. "They may identify some key items at a very hot promotional price, but they are promoting it on the shelf as a percentage savings off the national brand," he said.

Burris indicated in her column that Wegmans did not conduct its own private-label program because the company was not big enough to realize sufficient economies of scale in purchasing packaging materials.

"When Wegmans does something, they do it wholeheartedly and we support them," Maki said.