User:Biosthmors/Kroger

The Kroger on Ponce de Leon Avenue, nicknamed "Murder Kroger", is a supermarket located in the Poncey-Highland neighborhood of Atlanta, Georgia. An article in Creative Loafing called the store "one of the city's quirky charms that Atlantans seem to both love and hate at the same time". It opened shortly after 1986, when low-interest government loans were used to convert the adjacent and former Ford Motor Company Assembly Plant into lofts and commercial spaces. From the 1990s, and until at least 2002, the store had drivers license renewal services. In 2002 the store tested scan-it-yourself checkout devices. After two Publix supermarkets opened nearby, the store was refurbished. The closest neighboring Kroger, near Little Five Points, is the area's top performing one, as of 2006. Competitors to the Ponce Kroger also include Whole Foods, Sevananda, and Trader Joe's. Rumors in 2011 of an upgrade to the store were unfounded, though in 2013 a planned $1.5 million investment was announced.

In 1991, a 25-year-old woman died after a shooting in the parking lot. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution attributed the nickname "Scary Kroger" to the store because of the event. In October 1999, a man robbed the Bank of America inside the store. In August 2002, a strong odor raised the suspicions of a woman who reported her findings to police; a dead man was in a car in the parking lot. A song titled "Murder Kroger" by the group Attractive Eighties Women, which incorporates a mention of the nearby Clermont Lounge into the lyrics, is dedicated to shoppers who frequent the store.