Item 2. Properties
Item 2. PROPERTIES
Owned Properties
The Company owns the real property for 174 of its supermarkets (including the three temporarily closed stores), either as free-standing stores or as the anchor tenant in a Company-owned shopping center. The Company also owns 29 undeveloped sites which are suitable for a free-standing store or shopping center development. The Company additionally owns various outparcels and other acreage located adjacent to the shopping centers and supermarkets it owns. Real estate owned by the Company is generally located in the same geographic regions as its supermarkets. The Company’s shopping center rental operations are part of the Company’s “all other” segment. See Note 1 to the Consolidated Financial Statements contained in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
The shopping centers owned by the Company contain an aggregate of 9.2 million square feet of leasable space, of which 4.4 million square feet is used by the Company’s supermarkets. The remainder of the leasable space in these shopping centers is leased or held for lease by the Company to third-party tenants. A breakdown by size of the shopping centers owned and operated by the Company as of September 27, 2025 was as follows:
Size
Number
Less than 50,000 square feet
19
50,000 – 100,000 square feet
41
More than 100,000 square feet
40
Total
100
The Company owns a 1,649,000 square foot facility, which is strategically located between Interstate 40 and Highway 70 near Asheville, North Carolina, as well as the 119 acres of land on which it is situated. The facility includes the Company’s headquarters and its warehouse and distribution facility. The property also includes truck servicing and fuel storage facilities. The Company also owns a 139,000 square foot warehouse on 21 acres of land approximately one mile from its main warehouse and distribution facility.
The Company’s milk processing and packaging subsidiary, Milkco, Inc., owns a 140,000 square foot manufacturing and storage facility in Asheville, North Carolina. In addition to the plant, the 20-acre property includes truck cleaning and fuel storage facilities. While our manufacturing and storage facility did not sustain physical damage as a result of Hurricane Helene, the water outage and ban on water usage, which was not lifted until November 2024, impacted operations and results for the first quarter of fiscal year 2025.
Certain long-term debt of the Company is secured by the owned properties. See Note 7, “Long-Term Debt” to the Consolidated Financial Statements of this Annual Report on Form 10-K for further details.
Leased Properties
The Company operates supermarkets at 23 locations leased from various unaffiliated third parties. The Company has five owned store buildings that are on ground leases. The Company leases one other former supermarket location, which is subleased to a third party. The majority of these leases require the Company to pay property taxes, utilities, insurance, repairs and certain other expenses incidental to occupation of the premises. In addition to base rent, most leases contain provisions that require the Company to pay additional percentage rent (ranging from 0.75% to 1.00%) if sales exceed a specified amount.
Rental rates generally range from $3.09 to $8.49 per square foot. During fiscal 2025, 2024 and 2023, the Company paid cash supermarket rent of $6.2 million, $8.3 million and $9.4 million, respectively. These amounts exclude property taxes, utilities, insurance, repairs, other expenses, and non-cash rent adjustments. The following table summarizes lease expiration dates as of September 27, 2025, with respect to the initial and any renewal option terms of leased supermarkets properties:
Year of Expiration
Number of
(Including Renewal Terms)
Leases Expiring
2025-2036
4
2037-2051
1
2052 or after
19
Management believes that the long-term rent stability provided by these leases is a valuable asset of the Company.
Item 3. LEGAL PROCEEDING S
Various legal proceedings and claims arising in the ordinary course of business are pending against the Company. In the opinion of management, the ultimate liability, if any, from all pending legal proceedings and claims would not materially affect the Company’s business, financial condition, results of operations or cash flows.
16
Item 4. MINE SAFETY DISCLOSURES
Not applicable.
PART II
Text extracted from the filing as submitted to EDGAR. Formatting, tables and exhibits are simplified for reading; the original document is authoritative for anything you rely on.