On his return trip to Bellingham after a visit to Port Angeles Wednesday, John Clougher passed through Oak Harbor with more than just a few community suggestions weighing on his mind.

“I had a truckload of samples that I went home with,” Clougher said.

Clougher, the chief executive officer of Haggen’s Pacific Northwest division, has been on the go ever since Haggen started converting acquired Safeway and Albertsons grocery stores to its banner earlier this month.

As part of the transition in each new community, the grocery chain is holding public meetings conducted by Clougher and other company executives to answer questions, acquire feedback and mostly to begin the process of forming local partnerships with growers and other food producers.

Oak Harbor’s turn is fast approaching with the conversion from Safeway to Haggen on Highway 20 scheduled to take place over two days next week and the new Oak Harbor grocery store tentatively planning to open its doors at 9 a.m., Friday, March 6.

Committed to being local through its slogan of “Northwest fresh,” the Bellingham-based grocery chain is inviting Whidbey Island farmers, food producers and community members to attend a meeting March 19 in Oak Harbor to learn more about partnership opportunities with the Haggen brand as well as to have a chance to ask questions to company executives.

Nonprofit leaders also are invited to learn more about Haggen’s community giving, and small businesses may come to explore co-marketing programs.

The meeting will be held 5-6 p.m. at the Oak Harbor Yacht Club, 1301 SE Catalina Drive.

“Being based in Bellingham and basically operating along the I-5 corridor, we’ve had years to build up (relationships) with apple farmers and blueberry growers and fishermen,” Clougher said. “We’re trying to come into communities from day one, saying, ‘We know we don’t have that right now and we want to begin a process to engage.’

“Where Albertsons and Safeway centralize everything through their big warehouses, we don’t do that. We rely on independent distributors. We actually are big with direct store delivery. If somebody has enough product to supply just one store, that’s an opportunity. It doesn’t have to be a chain-wide client.”

Earlier this month, Haggen started the process of acquiring 146 stores in five states as part of the divestment process required by the Federal Trade Commission after the mega-merger of Safeway and Albertsons.

In Oak Harbor, the change will take two days with Safeway shutting its doors at 6 p.m. Tuesday then re-opening with a Haggen banner roughly 46 hours later.

Haggen is retaining the employees and managers at Safeway and will continue in-store relationships with Starbucks and Alaska Federal Credit Union.

However, Haggen will no longer run the gas station on the property or offer a gas rewards program, Clougher said. The gas station will remain open but under a new “national brand.”

“We’re grocery operators,” he said. “We don’t have expertise in gas.

“What I would say in our approach to Safeway stores is to simplify. While we may not have the gas rewards program, we’re also not going to require any type of card to get discounts.”

As part of each store opening, Haggen is partnering with five local nonprofits.

The Boys & Girls Club of Oak Harbor has been designated to receive a $1,000 donation. Four other nonprofits will be selected after the community meeting with 2 percent of the store’s sales on four consecutive Saturdays earmarked to be donated.

In Oak Harbor since 1967, Safeway will eventually replace the nearby Albertsons store on Southwest Erie Street in a move planned for this summer.

The Oak Harbor Albertsons was not part of the Haggen acquisition.

When the move takes place, Albertsons employees will remain under the new Safeway banner, Safeway spokesperson Sara Osborne said.

Clougher said that the Haggen store that opens its doors next week in Oak Harbor will only be a starting point to what it will grow into over time through local partnerships.

“We want to begin a process around evolving our local food supply chain,” he said. “We’re trying to be very honest that we don’t know everything. And we’re trying to start the exploration of growers, food manufacturers, fishermen, spice makers, things like that.”

The prospect of a first store on Whidbey Island is exciting to the company, he said.

Haggen was founded in Bellingham in 1933 and, with the acquisitions, is growing from 18 stores in the Pacific Northwest to 164 stores in Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada and Arizona.

“I think everybody in the organization loves to try new things,” Clougher said. “It’s a great opportunity for us to get to know the island and just places you’ve never seen, so it’s definitely exciting.

“I definitely appreciate that it’s close enough to Bellingham. I don’t think it’s right next door, but it’s close enough for us to get there. We don’t know what we don’t know, and I think that’s a level of excitement.”