Fred Meyer is the most popular grocery store in the Seattle area

Fred Meyer is the most popular grocery chain in the Seattle area, with 18.4% of the market share as of last year.

• Safeway and Costco are the second- and third-most-popular grocery stores, with 17.3% and 16.1% of the local market share, respectively.

• That's according to new data from Chain Store Guide, which tracks the retail and food service industries.

The big picture: Nationwide, Walmart is the most popular grocery store, claiming 25.2% of the national market share.

• But here, Walmart is only No. 5.
• The figures show that local and regional favorites can give the big box stores a run for their money.
• "At a time when politics divides opinion nationally on many big brands, grocery brands have been able to maintain loyalty and trust across demographics by maintaining a steady presence in their communities," Axios' Sara Fischer and Emily Peck write.

Of note: Other grocers that don't have big brand names claim about 10.5% of the Seattle region's market share, showing that many people here prefer their small neighborhood favorites.

Yes, but: Kroger owns both Fred Meyer and QFC, making the company the dominant player in the local grocery scene. Together, those two Kroger subsidiaries account for about one-third of the Seattle region's grocery market.

What's next: Amazon — which acquired Whole Foods in 2017 for $13.4 billion — is looking to dramatically expand the grocery wing of its commerce empire, Axios' Richard Collings and Kimberly Chin write.

• "We need a broader physical store footprint given that most of the grocery shopping still happens in physical venues," Amazon CEO Andy Jassy recently wrote in a letter to shareholders.