A reasons why HyVee stores operate different than Fareway, and are priced differently - each store director sets his/her own prices. The only prices set by corporate are Advertised prices, and every day low price items. HyVee was built on autonomy, and that will never change. Also, their are only two pay plans for HyVee managers - commission or salary. The only way a HyVee manager is on salary is when they open a new store, or go through a major remodel on their location, once the store becomes profitable, they are taken off salary. Therefore, if the store director is on commission and his/her store doesn't make money, they don't get paid. There is no salary + bonus plan for store directors as the poster lists above. I worked for store directors who didn't make money and didn't get a paycheck, it was not a lot of fun. As for buildings, HyVee doesn't own a majority of their stores, they are leased, so the store has to pay a landlord for the space. The bank in Chariton does not lend the money for the buidling of the stores and they don't borrow against the trust fund, again this is an incorrect statement by the original poster. The trust fund (retirement plan) hasn't existed for almost ten years, when it was changed to a 401(k), and is managed by Principal Financial not Midwest Heritage Bank. Basically what it comes down to is - every piece of equipment in a HyVee store is paid for by the corporation, and then charged back to the store. The store has to make enough money to payback corporate through sales and profits. Therefore, each store director has to run his/her store to make money. They do this hrough controlling expenses (labor, inventory, utilities, etc.) and pricing. Based on the market, if you can get a little more on some items, you do it, on others you take less. I am very familiar with this because I worked for HyVee for 16 years, and spent 11 years in Senior Level Management reporting directly to the store director. I was responsible for the profitability of five departments, and know a P&L statement pretty darn well. I also know the pricing pretty well and what it tales to make money. I also dealt with many vendors who thought they knew HyVee, but in all reality don't really know much. HyVee is privately held, and they rarely if ever tell you much at all about the company. Another member of my family retired from HyVee after 32 years in their corporate office as an executive staff member/stockholder. He worked directly with building new stores and remodels, and dealt with a lot of landlords and went to many stockholders meetings.
As for meat, you're crazy not to buy from a local meat locker. The quality is much better than any grocery store, and it has never left the building. There are many meat lockers around the DSM area - Winterset, Redfield, Indianola just to name a few. I had a whole hog butchered through the locker in Winterset, it is the best pork I've ever had, and much better than anything from the grocery store. I have a whole beef coming in the next week. I got to pick exactly what I wanted, the size of the steaks, roasts, number of pounds of ground beef, etc. I've worked with the DMACC farm on both the pork and beef, and the process has been a breeze.
I will shop at HyVee any day of the week over Fareway, and not just because I worked there for many years, but because of what they do for the community and the state. The Ames stores are huge supporters of Iowa State, and the company as a whole sponsors a ton of evernts, and gives money to charity. In DSM, they have sponsored three of the Honor Flights for WW II veterans, they do the HyVee kids fishing derby, support the DSM Barnstormers, gave $100,000 to the Earthquake victims in Haiti, and the list goes on. I don't ever see Fareway doing this, and they do nothing to suport ISU.
