Parish Oil Co., Inc. v. Dillon Companies, Inc.

McCONNELL, Circuit Judge.

We must decide, under a now-amended Colorado unfair competition statute, whether a grocery store may sell gasoline below cost if such sales are conditioned on the purchase of enough groceries above cost that the entire series of transactions comes in at a profit. We hold that it may, and therefore reverse a jury’s judgment in favor of the competitors who challenged this practice.

I

A

Defendant Dillon Companies, a Kansas corporation and subsidiary of the Cincin nati-based Kroger Co., operates two of the four full-service grocery stores in the city of Montrose, Colorado,…