Profit of Kroger Co. went down by 27 per cent for the fourth quarter. The company reported the results on Tuesday.

This happened despite the fact that its overall sales figure went up because of the gasoline incentives that it gave to its customers.

The grocer's profits declined from $349.2 million during last year to become $255.4 million for the current period. Profit per share came out to be 39 cents per share as against 53 cents per share in the year ago period.

On the other hand, its sales went up by 7 per cent to become $18.6 billion, including fuels. Excluding that, the sales rose by merely 2 per cent.

While the profit is higher than what the experts had estimated, what is disappointing is that the outlook given by the company for 2010 is not very good.

The company is going to follow a "cautious" approach for 2010. Rising competition, fluctuating fuel margins, inflation concerns, rising operating costs and slow pace of economic recovery are the reasons which could be the hurdle in its growth.

Kroger is trying to build a solid customer base through different schemes.