Kroger buys Home Chef to take bigger bite of meal-kit market
NEW YORK (AP) - Kroger, looking to take a bigger bite of the online grocery market, is buying meal-kit seller Home Chef.
Home Chef, like other meal-kit companies, sends a box of ingredients and recipes to its subscribers' doorsteps. Kroger will pay $200 million for Chicago-based Home Chef, and may pay an additional $500 million over five years if sales reach certain milestones. Kroger plans to put Home Chef kits in its supermarkets.
Competition among meal-kit companies is fierce. Albertsons bought Plated last year, Walmart is expanding its easy-to-make dinners, and meal-kit company Blue Apron started selling some of its kits in Costco stores. Amazon, which bought Whole Foods last year, also sells its own meal kits.
FILE - This June 17, 2014, file photo, shows a Kroger store in Houston. Kroger, looking to take a bigger bite of the online grocery market, is buying meal-kit seller Home Chef. Home Chef, like other meal-kit companies, sends a box of raw ingredients and recipes to its subscriber's doorsteps. Kroger will pay $200 million for Chicago-based Home Chef, and may pay an additional $500 million over five years if sales reach certain milestones. Kroger plans to put Home Chef kits in its supermarkets. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip, File)
Kroger Co., which has 2,800 stores, says it expects the deal to close in the second quarter.
