Lee Nile will now be the face of former Tranten’s grocery store in Farmington after Food City purchased the market on November 5. Andrea Swiedom/Franklin Journal

FARMINGTON — “They ran a pretty good program, we’ve got big shoes to fill,” Food City Store Manager Lee Nile said about the Tranten brothers. 

The family-owned Tranten’s grocery store in Farmington was sold to the Lewiston-based and employee owned company Food City on Thursday, Nov. 5. The transition of ownership took place the following day with Nile now overseeing the store alongside the Wilton and Livermore Food Cities that he manages.

The sale took place largely because Nile pitched the idea to his boss, Food City CEO  Zak Sclar, after hearing that the Tranten brothers were not renewing their lease. As a Wilton and Chesterville native, Nile was eager to absorb his neighborhood grocery under his management.

Nonetheless, the sale was a nail-biting process as this is the first purchase Food City has made since the onset of the pandemic.

“We weren’t really 100% sure until the day we signed the check because there’s always that fear of if we went into another shut-down or if something happened,” Nile said. 

Food City will retain all of Tranten’s employees and other than more competitive pricing and a new sign, Food City will not initiate any major changes, Nile said.

“We can take advantage of a little better pricing and some other deals because we run 10 stores and eight other Food Cities,” Nile said. “We’re still going to use a lot of local products, we’re still going to deal with all the vendors they deal with.”