Report: C&S Wholesale Grocers, Winn-Dixie group close to acquiring stores from AldiReport: C&S Wholesale Grocers, Winn-Dixie group close to acquiring stores from Aldi

C&S Wholesale Grocers and members of Winn-Dixie’s management team are working to acquire about 350 Winn-Dixie grocery and liquor stores from Aldi, according to a Reuters report Friday. 

Sources close to the matter said Aldi has been working with investment bankers for weeks to divest some of the nearly 400 Winn-Dixie locations it acquired from Southeastern Grocers in 2023.

The C&S Wholesale Grocers group will acquire 170 Winn-Dixie grocery stores and another 170 Winn-Dixie liquor stores, according to Reuters.

German discount grocer Aldi, headquartered in the U.S. in Batavia, Ill., plans to convert the remaining Winn-Dixie stores to the Aldi format.

C&S, based in Keene, N.H., is a supplier by trade but also owns a handful of Grand Union and Piggly Wiggly stores.

Neither Aldi nor C&S Wholesale Grocers have responded to requests for comment.

Aldi has been growing rapidly over the last year and plans further expansion. The discount grocer has set a goal of investing $9 billion over the next five years to open 800 new U.S. locations. These locations will include both new openings and existing store conversions, but officials did not disclose how many Winn-Dixie stores will be converted to Aldi stores following the Southeastern Grocers acquisition, which also included Harveys Supermarket stores.

Related:5 things you might not have known about the Kroger, Albertsons merger decision

Aldi currently operates over 2,400 locations in the U.S. and announced in September that it was hiring 13,000 store and warehouse workers to handle the holiday rush and rapid store growth.

Meanwhile, C&S Wholesale Grocers played a major role in the failed $24.6 billion merger between Kroger and Albertsons. The deal included a plan to divest 579 Kroger and Albertsons stores to C&S.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), however, argued that C&S Wholesale Grocers was an unfit divestiture partner, and in early December, judges in Oregon and Washington rejected the merger.

Albertsons then terminated the merger agreement and sued Kroger for billions of dollars, stating that Kroger refused to offer an adequate divestiture package and repeatedly ignored regulators’ concerns. Reports indicate that at least 60 companies, including Aldi, expressed interest in becoming a divestiture partner.