Who owns Kroger?

In 1883, 23-year-old Bernard Kroger, the fifth of ten children of German immigrants, invested his life savings of $372 (roughly $10,000 in 2020) in opening a grocery store. By 1902, the Kroger Grocery and Baking Company had been incorporated.

By this time, the company had grown to forty stores and sold $1.75 million worth of merchandise each year. In addition, Kroger became the first grocery chain to have its own bakery.

In 1920, the company had begun a process of rapid expansion beyond the Cincinnati area. Kroger sold his shares and retired from the business in 1928. The following year the company was operating 5,575 stores -- more than ever before or since.

In the 1930s, street-corner grocery stores were being replaced by supermarkets, which were larger in size but fewer in number. The company assumed its present name in 1946.

Currently, the largest shareholder of Kroger is BlackRock Inc., with 10% of the total shares. Berkshire Hathaway Inc. is a close second with 8.4% of the total shares in Kroger and State Street Corp with 5%. Since 2014, Rodney McMullen has served as Kroger's CEO, and he has around 300,000 shares in Kroger.