Updated 4:16 p.m.

The Fred Meyer at Southeast 82nd Avenue and Foster Road will close by Jan. 20, the grocer's corporate parent said Wednesday, citing underperformance.

"The decision to close this location was based on long-term business performance and forecasts," spokesman Jeffery Temple said in a written statement. The fuel center, however, will remain open, he said.

Temple said each of the store's employees will be offered a job at another location. Fred Meyer is owned by Cincinnati-based Kroger, which also owns QFC.

Fred Meyer will consider community interests and plans to market the property for "best possible use," Temple said.

He said the company has no plans to close any other stores at the moment, and does not plan to open another store to replace the one on Foster.

The closure will leave many area residents with few shopping options, apart from an Asian grocery store across the street.

Though a Walmart operates at 82nd Avenue and Holgate, and a WinCo recently opened near 82nd and Powell, neither is within easy walking distance for anyone who lives south of Foster.

And the closest Fred Meyer store is nearly two miles away, at Southeast 82nd and Johnson Creek Boulevard.

This USDA map of the area, with the Fred Meyer location in brown, shows how little access East Portland residents have to grocery stores. The purple areas show tracts where over a third of residents live more than a mile from the nearest supermarket, and the green areas show tracts where over a third of residents live more than half a mile from the nearest grocery store.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which tracks food deserts, more than a third of residents in the U.S. Census tracts surrounding the closing Fred Meyer store already live at least a half-mile away from the nearest supermarket.

Recently released Census data show that the area's population has grown in the past several years. About 12 percent of residents near the store live in poverty, up slightly from 2010.

The Foster location has proved a tough one for grocers. A nearby Safeway pulled out in 2004. At the time, the grocery chain said the store was one of its oldest and smallest in the region, and opted to close it rather than upgrade it.

The decision to close is a departure for Fred Meyer, which has invested heavily in upgrading older locations.

One of the last Fred Meyer closures in the area was in 2002, when the company shuttered its store in Gresham's Rockwood neighborhood. At the time, the company cited declining sales and profitability as the reason. But others said the store was unprofitable due to rampant shoplifting.

-- Anna Marum

amarum@oregonian.com

503-294-5911

@annamarum