Albertsons has appointed Ken Rinaldi as regional operating president of its newly created East Region, a company spokeswoman confirmed to Grocery Dive.

Rinaldi now leads a group that includes the Jewel-Osco and Shaw's banners. Jewel-Osco operates 190 supermarkets across Illinois, Iowa and Indiana. Shaw's runs 126 locations in Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Vermont.

The job is a step up for a longtime company insider. Rinaldi most recently served as president of Albertsons' Shaw's and Star Market banners in the Northeast. He started his career bagging groceries for Star Market while in high school.

Albertsons formed the East Region in July when it adopted a new operating model designed to improve its financial performance. The revised structure consolidated the company's 11 former divisions into four regions: East, California, West and South.

CEO Susan Morris laid out the rationale when the company announced the changes. The goal of the simplified structure, she said, is to "sharpen accountability and strengthen execution in the areas that matter most to our customers: fresh service, store standards, local merchandising and community connection."

The leadership appointment is one of several moves Albertsons has made in recent weeks. Earlier in September, the company recruited former technology industry leader Meg Whitman to serve as executive chair.

The restructuring comes against a difficult financial backdrop. Albertsons posted a same-store sales decline in its latest quarter and said it expects that metric to remain negative for all of fiscal 2026. Investors have responded sharply: the company's stock price has fallen more than 30% since the start of 2026.

Rinaldi's appointment fills a key post in the four-region structure as Albertsons works to show that its reorganization can translate the operational focus Morris described into a sales turnaround.