Penn Traffic Co. (fka PTFCQ)

[Blue54]

http://buffalo.bizjournals.com/buffalo/stories/2010/02/01/daily49.html?ana=yfcpc

Today

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand is urging Tops Markets LLC to use caution when it considers which of the 79 Penn Traffic stores will be sold or closed.

The Amherst-based Tops, last week, closed on the oft-discussed deal to purchase the Penn Traffic stores for $85 million. Penn Traffic, which is headquartered in Syracuse, filed for bankruptcy protection in November. Its stores were put out to bid by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del. with Tops submitting the only bid for Penn Traffic’s entire supermarket portfolio.

The catch is, while Tops’ officials, said they will keep most of the Penn Traffic stores, some will likely be sold or closed. Penn Traffic employs 5,700 people through its P&C stores in Central New York, portions of Pennsylvania, Vermont and New Hampshire.

“I want to urge you to protect as many jobs and keep as many stores as possible as the stores switch ownership,” Gillibrand, New York’s junior senator, wrote in a Feb. 4 letter to Frank Curci, Tops president and chief executive officer. “In the release that you put out on Jan. 8, you stated that your goal was ‘..to keep as many jobs and operate as many stores, without interruption in service..’ It is my hope that you stick to that pledge.”

Curci, in an interview with Business First, said the store at most risk at the three in Vermont and New Hampshire.

“We will run a majority of the stores,” Curci said. “We didn’t buy the stores for anything other than to run them.”

Gillibrand said she is concerned that if any of the Penn Traffic stores in rural communities are closed, it could negatively impact those towns and municipalities.

Store closings could severely impact senior citizens in those towns, Gillibrand said.

“Those (seniors) without adequate transportation would be forced to travel great distances to get to another grocery store, creating an extraordinary hardship,” Gillibrand wrote in her letter to Curci. “In many towns, the supermarket is a central hub of the community and I urge you to consider the employees and their families during evaluation of the economic vitality of the 79 stores.”

Curci said all store decisions will be deeply researched. Tops will not be making an knee-jerk decisions.

“There’s only a very small group of stores that may be better served if they were owned by someone else,” Curci said.

Tops will take over the full operation of the Penn Traffic stores in early March. Penn Traffic operates Quality, Bi-Lo and P&C supermarkets.

The Penn Traffic deal will virtually double the number of stores Tops has in its chain and could see its annual revenues increase by more than 17.6 percent. Tops currently owns 71 stores and has five franchised outlets.

The deal could also see Tops add at least 50 new jobs at its Amherst headquarters.