Empire Company

Empire Company Limited

Type	Public
Traded as	TSX: EMP.A
Industry	Conglomerate/ Holding company
Headquarters	Stellarton, Nova Scotia, Canada
Key people	Marc Poulin (CEO)
Number of employees	34,637 (2008)[1]
Subsidiaries	Sobeys Crombie REIT Safeway Canada FreshCo Foodland Price Chopper
Website	www.empireco.ca

Empire Company Limited is a Canadian conglomerate engaged mostly in food retail and corporate investments. The company is headquartered in Stellarton, Nova Scotia. Empire Company also owns the Sobeys supermarket chain. The company was founded in 1963.^[2]

Acquisitions

Empire Company has a long history of acquisitions. The ones worth mentioning are:

• 1976. Lawton's Drug Stores Limited, which operated 18 stores in Nova Scotia.
• November 1980 - July 1981 Empire acquires Sobey Holdings Limited, gaining a 50.97% stake in the company.
• February 1983 Empire ups its ownership of Hannaford Bros. Co., an American food retailer, to 25% (Sold in 2000)
• June 1987 Empire buys the remaining 49.03% of Sobeys, making it an entirely owned subsidiary. (Sold in 1998, re-bought in 2007)
• 1987 Empire buys out its partner in Empire Theatres, turning it into an entirely owned subsidiary.
• May 1988 Empire buys a 25% stake in Provigo.
• 1988 Empire acquires an additional 22% stake in Wajax, resulting in a total ownership of 45%.
• June 1989 Empire re-purchases the outstanding share of Atlantic Shopping Centres, making it an entirely owned subsidiary.
• December 1993 Empire Real Estate buys 64% of Halifax Developments, Ltd; making it an entirely owned subsidiary.
• December 1998 Empire buys Oshawa Group for $1.5 billion.
• January 2001 Empire Real Estate buys a 35.7% stake in Genstar Developmental Partnership for $29,000,000.
• February 2004 Sobey's acquires Commisso's Food Markets, and Empire Real Estate acquires Commisso's real estate for a total of 103.5 million.
• September 2005 Empire Theatres acquires 27 more theatres.
• August 2006 Sobey's acquires Achille de la Chevrotière Ltée, including its grocery chain of about 25 stores in Quebec and Ontario. This costs $79.2 million.
• July 15, 2007 Empire re-buys the remaining outstanding Sobey's share, making it once again an entirely owned subsidiary.
• September 2007 Sobeys buys Thrifty Foods for $256.6 million.
• 2012 Empire buys 236 retail gas locations in Quebec and Atlantic Canada for $214.9 million.
• June 2013 Empire buys all of Safeway Canada's stores for $5.8 billion

Sales of Subsidiaries/Interests

• 1998 Empire sells 38% of Sobeys, putting it out on the public stock exchange.
• 2000 Empire sells its 25% stake in Hannaford Bros Co for $1.03 billion.
• March 2002 Empire sells Serca Foodservice to SYSCO for $411 million.
• June 2005 When Wajax became an income trust, Empire sold 2.875 million shares for $50.8 million.
• 2006 Empire sells 44 properties to Crombie REIT.
• April 2008 Empire sells another 61 properties to Crombie REIT
• 2011 Empire sells its remaining share of Wajax.
• June 2013 Empire sells all Empire Theatres some to Cineplex Entertainment and Landmark Cinemas.^{[3] [4]}
• August 2013 Sobeys sells the land of 68 Safeway locations to Crombie REIT for $900 million.
• Oct/Nov/Dec 2013 Sobeys announces the closure of multiple locations in Alberta in preparation for the Safeway acquisition.

References

External links

• Official site