In an Impoverished City of The Appalachian Mountains, the closing of a Kroger grocery store may lead to a documentary film.
(1888PressRelease) February 04, 2014 - Galax, Virginia- In this small city of the rural Appalachian Mountains, a landmark grocery store is about to close. Famous for the advertising slogan "Gone Krogering", Galax, Virginia has had a Kroger grocery store for over eighty years. With the opening of a new Food City and a Walmart Superstore in recent years, the owners say that the small Kroger, located next to Roses, is no longer a profitable venture. When an advertising executive was visiting the mountains, the story goes, he overheard a patron speaking on the pay phone on the wall outside the store.
The patron told the person on the other end that he and the family had gone Krogering. Thus began one of the most successful advertising campaigns in marketing history.
Kroger has announced that employees wishing to continue to their employment may transfer to the new Radford Kroger about a hundred miles away. That is not an option for most of the employees who have family ties and financial obligations to the area. Patrons in the nearby government assisted living apartments who can now simply walk to Kroger for their groceries, will have to make other arrangements.
"I don't see why they have to close the store", says Misty Ruff of the Brush Creek area of Carroll County. She and her husband Hubert do all of their family shopping at Kroger on Tuesdays to take advantage of deals including the 5% senior discount. Linda Moore, also of Brush Creek, has shopped at Kroger for sixty years. "I don't know what we are going to do around here without our Kroger", she says. " I've been Krogering for over sixty years."
Local patrons have put up a web site asking that the Kroger executives not close their store. "Times have changed", says Donald Hodges of Ivanhoe. "But I don't see this as a change for the better. We are the ones that started the whole Gone Krogering concept. It used to be what the mountain folk around here did on the weekends when they'd go into town. Now, I guess we won't go Krogering anymore." Hodges is in his seventies. Independent film maker Charles Howard Thomas is considering making a documentary entitled "Gone Krogering" about the closing of the landmark store and the end of an era.
In an Impoverished City of The Appalachian Mountains, the closing of a Kroger grocery store may lead to a documentary film. 
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