First Haggen store conversion

Haggen employees replace Albertsons price tags with Haggen tags at a store in Monroe, Washington. Haggen executives have said prices won't change much at the stores it takes over, but Tom Gillpatrick, a PSU professor who helps train grocery store executives, says he expects prices to rise at stores that convert from Albertsons to the Haggen brand.

(Courtesy of Haggen)

As Haggen prepares to take over 20 Albertsons and Safeway stores in Oregon, our readers are wondering how the changes will affect prices.

We were curious, too, so we conducted an un-scientific survey to see how prices at an existing Haggen store in Tualatin stacked up against the competition. On February 24, we compared prices for a few common grocery items at seven Portland-area stores, including Haggen. This is what we found.

(Graphic by Mark Graves/The Oregonian)

While we weren't surprised that Winco and Walmart gave us the cheapest totals, we weren't expecting New Seasons' prices to come in cheaper than Fred Meyer's. The Haggen prices were lower than expected, too. And we were somewhat surprised to see Albertsons come in as the most expensive - our bill was nearly $7 more there than it was at Winco.

However, keep in mind that this price comparison only measures a handful of items at a few locations on a particular day - this doesn't mean that Albertsons is always the most expensive or Winco will always be your best bet for cheap groceries. (While we weren't able to hit every grocery store chain in the area, we felt like these stores were a good mix of value chains and mid- and upper-market grocers.)

Tom Gillpatrick, who heads Portland State University's Food Industry Leadership Center, chalked up the unexpected prices to pricing strategies like high-low pricing.

Grocers that subscribe to this strategy usually price some number of their core products fairly low, but hike up prices for the rest, he said. So while New Seasons' prices are competitive when shopping for the basics, a shopping list with specialty items might set you back more than it would elsewhere.

What do you think? Does this price comparison match your shopping experience? Why or why not? Where do you do the bulk of your grocery shopping?

-- Anna Marum

amarum@oregonian.com

503-294-5911

@annamarum