I did see someone on Reddit who said they used to work there at the 1st Avenue CR store (so, yeah, not a confirmed source, take it for what it’s worth) and they said that store hadn't turned a profit in two years. I can believe that, I think, although with the prices HyVee charges and the margins they should make on what most of the customers at that store buy, it seems more like poor management than anything else.
That person also said one of the major expenses for that store was replacing all the grocery carts that kept getting taken and not returned. I think a quick conversation with Aldi executives might have revealed a solution for that …
They did get tax incentives from the city to rebuild on that site in 2001. Those ran out in 2021. So … here we are, I guess.