KROGER DALLAS UNIT MOVING OFFICES

KELLER, Texas -- The former offices of Affiliated Food Stores here are getting new tenants.

million in July, expects to relocate the headquarters of its Dallas Marketing Area to Affiliated's former offices early next year, according to a published report. The move affects about 75 Kroger personnel in Irving, Texas.

Kroger officials in the Dallas area declined to comment. Kroger operates about 80 supermarkets in the Dallas area.

Affiliated, after first filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 1990, has gone out of business. Kroger purchased the cooperative wholesaler's two-story office and 960,000-square-foot warehouse from Aetna Life Insurance Co., landlord of the facility.

Kroger already is in the process of consolidating its Dallas-area distribution operations into the former Affiliated facility and has renamed it Kroger Distribution Center. The consolidation covers the transfer of distribution operations previously handled in three separate Irving facilities.

Kroger expects to have about 400 former employees at the complex here by the end of the first quarter. The company planned to spend between $2.6 million and $4 million on improvements to the facilities.