Empire Company will devote $850 million to capital expenditures in its 2026 fiscal year.

The company indicated that it will commit most of those funds to commercial real estate-related aspects of its business. Empire said in its latest quarterly report that it will spend about half of the total allocation on renovations and new-store openings, including a 1.5% footprint expansion. The company has also dedicated 25% of its capital-expenditures budget to IT and business-development projects while committing the rest to logistics and sustainability.

“By the end of fiscal 2026, the company expects to complete the network renovations of approximately 20% to 25%, which began in fiscal 2024,” said Empire in its earnings report.

Empire spent $205 million on capex in its latest quarter ending November 1, up $56 million year-over-year. The investments included renovations and construction of new stores, advanced-analytics technology and other technology systems.

On an earnings call with analysts, newly appointed president and CEO Pierre St-Laurent pledged to deliver the full value of the investments that the company made in recent years. He indicated that a fairly significant part of the upcoming new-store openings could be discount outlets. He regards Empire’s discount-store offering as “underdeveloped.”

But he downplayed the forthcoming commitment.

“We have a lot of white space in discount, but we won’t just focus on discount because there (are) other markets where it’s not a discount market and there’s more opportunity to grow our Farm Boy, our Longo’s, our Food Land,” he said.

Empire owns numerous other grocery brands, notably Sobeys and Canada Safeway.