![handle is hein.journals/interal2023 and id is 1 raw text is:
Yale Law and Policy Review-Inter Alia (Spring 2023)
HOW TO STOP STOP & SHOP'S ANTI-COMPETITIVE LAND ACQUISITION TACTIC*
Karissa Kang
Yale Law School, J.D. '24
Introduction
When I first moved to New Haven from Atlanta, I was shocked-not by the weather, nor
by the lack of Southern cuisine, but by the dearth of grocery stores. In Atlanta, I had the luxury
of choosing between Publix, Kroger, Sprouts, Walmart, Target, Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, and
the Fresh Market. In New Haven, the only national supermarket chain with a store in town is
Stop & Shop. Many of my peers with cars make a weekly trek to the Trader Joe's ten miles
away. But the New Haven Stop & Shop is only half a mile away from my apartment, so I prefer
to walk there for my groceries.
It was probably during one of my many trips to Stop & Shop that I began to wonder why
New Haven-a city much smaller than Atlanta, to be fair, but much bigger than the Atlantan
suburb that I actually inhabited-had only one true, full-service grocery store. My inquiry led me
to learn about a tactic that numerous grocery store chains, including Stop & Shop, employ in
order to block out competition.1 For decades, these chains have been purchasing vacant
properties that are close in geographic proximity to their own stores and are well-suited to the
sale of groceries. Instead of moving into these properties, however, the chains have either kept
* J.D. 2024, Yale Law School; B.A. 2021, Emory University. My deepest thanks to Fiona Scott Morton for her
guidance and encouragement. My thanks also to the organizers of Reforming America's Food Retail Markets,
particularly Austin Frerick and David Townley. Finally, I am grateful to the editors of the Yale Law & Policy
Review, especially Isaiah Ogren and Isabelle Zaslavsky, for their support.
1 See, e.g., Al Norman, Wal-Mart Store Sits Empty Thanks to Wal-Mart, SPRAWL-BUSTERS (Feb. 21, 2010),
https://sprawl-busters.com/wal-mart-store-sits-emptythanks-to-wal-mart, [https://perma.cc/SBT6-EM6Q]; Steve
Farrell, Locked Out: Behind the Supermarket Restrictive Covenant Scandal, THE GROCER (Mar. 9, 2020),
https://www.thegrocer.co.uk/property-and-planning/locked-out-behind-the-supermarket-restrictive-covenant-
scandal/602585.article, [https://perma.cc/A3AF-JHR5] (It will come as no surprise to anyone who has observed the
food retail market over the years, as restrictive covenants have been a known feature of supermarket strategies for
decades.); and Steve Holt, How Leaving Stores Closed for Years Helps Grocery Chains and Hurts Communities
(Jan. 29, 2018), https://theworld.org/stories/2018-01-29/how-leaving-stores-closed-years-helps-grocery-chains-and-
hurts-communities, [https://perma.cc/RR6J-XSSV].](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/interal2023&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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