“Supermarket retail is an extremely low-margin, highly competitive industry in which we compete for customers on price and service everyday, and we are confident our customers will be the ultimate beneficiaries of these reforms,” said the letter signed by Wakefern Chairman and CEO Joseph Colalillo and more than two dozen other executives.

Congress directed the Federal Reserve to issue rules to ensure that debit swipe fees are reasonable and proportional to the processing costs incurred. The Federal Reserve is expected to issue their final debit card reforms in April.

The letter requests that the Senators continue to support Main Street businesses and consumers by ensuring reforms go into effect on time this year. Please view the complete Wakefern letter below.

March 14, 2011

Dear Senator Menendez and Senator Lautenberg:

We are writing to convey our strong support for debit card swipe fee reforms that will have an extremely positive impact on our ShopRite supermarkets and ultimately our customers.

Debit card swipe fees are one of the fast growing costs we face and are completely unpredictable. Supermarket retail is an extremely low-margin, highly competitive industry in which we compete for customers on price and service everyday, and we are confident our customers will be the ultimate beneficiaries of these reforms.

Any efforts to delay the Federal Reserve’s rulemaking on debit card fee reforms, which are on track to be finalized this April and implemented in July, will have a very significant impact on businesses in the state and customers who pay millions in debit card interchange fees.

We are extremely grateful for your support of the Durbin amendment during the last Congress and we hope we can count on your continued support for Main Street businesses and consumers by ensuring reforms go into effect on time this year.

Sincerely,

Joseph S. Colalillo Chairman & CEO, Wakefern Food Corp ShopRite of Hunterdon County

Larry Ammons ShopRite of Mullica Hill

James Bottino Bottino's Supermarkets, Inc.

Jeffrey Brown Brown's Super Stores, Inc.

Robert Clare ShopRite of Oakland

Rafael Cueller ShopRite of Passaic Karl W. Eickhoff ShopRite of Delran

Ned Gladstein ShopRite of West Caldwell

Irv Glass Glass Gardens, Inc.

Terry Glass Glass Gardens, Inc.

Neil Greenstein ShopRite of Brookdale Charles M. Infusino ShopRite of Little Falls

David Infusino Nutley Park ShopRite, Inc.

Lawrence R. Inserra, Jr. Inserra Supermarkets, Inc.

Vincent Lo Curcio, III Nutley Park ShopRite, Inc. Joel Perlmutter Perlmart, Inc.

Steven Ravitz Supermarkets of Cherry Hill

Dominick J. Romano Ronetco Supermarkets, Inc.

Richard Saker Saker Supermarkets, Inc.

Charles Shakoor ShopRite of Old Bridge

Leonard Sitar ShopRite of Carteret

Tony Smutko ShopRite of Hillside

James Sumas Village Supermarkets

Richard Tully ShopRite of Kearny

Larri Wolfson ShopRite of Lincoln Park

David Zallie Somerset Stores, LLC

George J. Zallie GMS Zallie Holdings

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Food Marketing Institute (FMI) conducts programs in public affairs, food safety, research, education and industry relations on behalf of its 1,500 member companies — food retailers and wholesalers — in the United States and around the world. FMI’s U.S. members operate approximately 26,000 retail food stores and 14,000 pharmacies. Their combined annual sales volume of $680 billion represents three-quarters of all retail food store sales in the United States. FMI’s retail membership is composed of large multi-store chains, regional firms and independent supermarkets. Its international membership includes 200 companies from more than 50 countries. FMI’s associate members include the supplier partners of its retail and wholesale members.

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