KROGER WILL OPEN FOUR NEW STORES, CLOSE FIVE

CINCINNATI -- Kroger Co. here said it will open its first ground-up Ralphs Grocery Co. units in the Sacramento area later this year.

l Dorado Hills. Both will be 52,000 square feet.

The company said it also plans to open a Ralphs store this year in Elk Grove and a Foods Co Food & Drug Warehouse unit in the Sacramento suburb of Natomas. (Foods Co is the name Ralphs uses on its Food 4 Less-style stores in northern California.)

Kroger said it also plans to close five underperforming Ralphs stores in northern California within the next three months -- three in Sacramento, one in Citrus Heights and one in Davis. The five locations were part of the 18 stores Ralphs acquired from Albertson's when it entered the Sacramento market in September 1999.

The company said the five stores have been underperforming since they were acquired and could not achieve profitability despite efforts to upgrade and remodel them. Kroger said it will attempt to find positions for as many of the 250 people working at those stores as possible at other locations in the area.

Ralphs, a division of Kroger Co, operates 450 stores in California and Nevada.