Refuse at Ralphs: Grocery Tosses Hundreds of Items, Quickly Restocks

While La Mesa households had to decide what food to toss after Thursday night’s massive power outage, grocery stores were dealing with much bigger losses.
 
The Ralphs on Grossmont Boulevard was hit the hardest as workers discarded all food from the cold cases on the inside perimeter of the store, sales manager Tony Bell said Friday morning.
 
Meat, deli, bakery and dairy shelves were bare at 5 a.m., Bell said. By noon, workers were feverishly restocking food as it was trucked in from distribution centers in Riverside and Compton.
 
“We put in emergency orders last night,” he said. “Milk just came in a few minutes ago.”
 
Bell said he couldn’t begin to estimate the financial loss, but noted: “It’s very sad. It’s a lot of money.”
 
Everything perishable in the store is now fresh because of the ongoing deliveries, he said. He expects the store to be fully stocked by mid-day Saturday.
 
Bell said that his crew tried to save food with dry ice and storage, but that the compressors didn’t hold up.

Other La Mesa grocery stores fared better because of cold storage facilities and a little luck.

At the Albertsons on Fletcher Parkway, shelves were well-stocked Friday morning. A manager said his food loss was “nothing significant.” Cheese, smoked meat and yogurt were among the items that spoiled and had to be pulled.
 
But Albertsons had unexpected help.

Fortune smiled on the store: A half-hour after the power went out, a refrigerated truck pulled up, and the store managers used the truck to store most of their perishables, a manager said.
 
“We were very lucky,” he said.
 
At the La Mesa Springs shopping center on University at Allison Avenue, Vons also lost some meat, deli items and produce to the warming temperatures in the food cases. However, shelves were stocked except for some meat items.
 
Friday, “we are selling a lot of water and a lot of milk,” said manager Alan Baum. “It’s very busy.”
 
At the Vons on Lake Murray Boulevard at Baltimore Drive, manager Rene Islas said that “it seems like a normal day. We’ve restocked the wall of meats and the only thing we had to pull was chicken—for safety issues.”

Next-door at Outback Steakhouse, manager Tom Halcomb said the restaurant never opened Thursday because of its normal 4 p.m. start.
 
“We lost business, but no products,” he said. “The refrigeration held up long enough for us to get a lot of dry ice.”

He was busy getting set up for Friday’s meals.