CluenexThe Kroger Co. KR
The Kroger Co. scores weak on business quality (2.7 of 10). Here is why, in plain words, and what our sealed record shows.
Why it matters
- What The Kroger Co. does
Kroger operates supermarkets and multi-department stores across the United States, making money primarily through retail grocery and pharmacy sales to everyday consumers. The company is leaning into digital delivery and customer loyalty programs to defend its footprint against discount competitors.
- What it does best
Kroger dominates traditional grocery scale, generating $149.3 billion in revenue with a gross margin of 23.1%. This massive volume secures supplier rebates that smaller regional players like ACI, with its 27.0% margin, struggle to match on pure product acquisition costs.
- The main risk
Inflation and aggressive promotional discounting squeeze margins in a thin-margin business. Operating margin sits at just 3.2%, leaving almost no room for cost missteps without threatening net income.
Quality, check by check
Scored against its own industry, from company filings.
Operating margin sits at 3.2% with a net margin of 0.7%, landing in the bottom decile of its sector at the 9th percentile. Scale fails to drive wide margins in this low-margin retail model.
Scale and local store density lock in everyday consumers within regional US markets. Gross margin sits in the bottom quartile of its sector at the 22nd percentile, limiting pricing power.
Revenue growth crawled to 0.3% over the latest period, reflecting a stagnant top line compared to historical multi-year revenue ranges near $147 billion to $150 billion.
Debt-to-equity sits at 3.0, backed by $14.3 billion in net debt and $3.3 billion in cash. Free cash flow reached $2.4 billion, but heavy buybacks of $3.7 billion strain the balance sheet further.
Insiders
Executives and directors, from SEC Form 4 filings we read ourselves. Open market trades only; grants, option exercises and pre-planned sales left out.
2 sold $6.2M outside pre-planned sales.
Our sealed record on KR
Verdicts appear here 30 days after we publish them; members see today's. Each one is in the nightly ledger, fingerprinted the night it was made.
The first sealed verdicts appear here on Oct 11, 2026.
Questions
The Kroger Co. scores weak on the Cluenex quality check (2.7 of 10), measured against its own industry. Profitability is weak, moat fair, growth slow and financial health weak.
In the last 90 days of SEC Form 4 filings: 2 sold $6.2M outside pre-planned sales.
Dec 2, 2026.
See KR today
- Today's verdict on KR, and why
- Fair value with cautious, base and optimistic cases
- The exact price that would change the verdict
- Which stocks each signal names, the night it fires
Cite this page: Cluenex, “The Kroger Co. (KR)”, https://cluenex.com/stocks/kr/, data as of Oct 10, 2026.