A Kroger location at 6700 Woodlands Pkwy, The Woodlands, TX 77382, will close by May 6th. The store has been the anchor of the Sterling Ridge Shopping Center since it opened in December 2000. Kroger and Randalls initially dominated The Woodlands; however, by 2004, an HEB opened across the street from this location. In 2012, Trader Joe’s entered the Houston market with a store catty-corner to Kroger. Kroger has not expanded on why this location is closing, but increased competition was likely considered in the decision-making process. This store is notable as it contained the final location of Kroger’s “Huggies Land” in-store daycare concept. Initially a standard feature of Kroger Signature stores, most Huggies Land locations closed only a few years after opening. The Sterling Ridge location outlived Kroger’s partnership with Huggies, rebranding as Hugslie Land before finally closing around 2020.
As a shareholder living in Louisiana, I asked the question of expansion at last year’s shareholder meeting and areas for potential growth. Rodney McMillan was non-committal and touted the on-line fulfillment center for customers to order and have it delivered to your house. Lots of good for me as the nearest center was in San Antonio and the nearest Kroger store 100 miles from me.
It has been a long time since I’ve been to The Woodlands, but I didn’t know this store was having sales problems. Back when Mike and I were doing The Year of Kroger posts here at HHR in 2023, we considered featuring this store given that it held onto the Hugslieland way after most other locations closed. Of course, by 2023, it was also closed at this location so we decided to feature other Kroger Signature locations, including the Pearland location which had the first Huggies Land.
This is not the first Kroger to close in the Houston area in the last decade or so, but it is interesting especially given that it is not too far away from the Kroger Houston Division headquarters. There has been a recent executive shakeup at Kroger’s main headquarters in Cincinnati and we’ll have to see if the new leadership puts more emphasis on store growth/replacement than the previous leadership who was seemingly more concerned with growth via acquisition and let areas like Houston languish as far as growth goes.