The Kroger Company has officially declined to renew its lease for the vacant "baby Kroger" store at the Peachtree Crossing shopping center.

Bill Hooper, the managing partner of the shopping center, said this morning that Kroger has submitted paperwork declining to renew the lease. Kroger vacated the site last spring after closing the store it had bought several years before from Harris Teeter.

Hooper is hopeful he will be able to attract The Fresh Market company to open a store here. Fresh Market officials were reportedly on the brink of committing to open a store in Peachtree City last year but the deal fell through at the last minute.

While Kroger has had the store listed on the commercial real estate market, any tenant which moved in would be sub-leasing the site from Kroger, which might scare off some retailers.

Had Kroger re-upped the lease it would have given the company the power to forbid another grocery competitor from moving into the baby Kroger site.

The Fresh Market is a specialty retail grocer that some residents believe would fit nicely in at Peachtree Crossings.