I've been to so many investor conferences that I've become rather knowledgeable about the menus of some of New York's leading hotels. I know which ones serve salmon and which ones serve chicken, and know that very few serve steak. In fact, a tasty porterhouse is about as rare as obtaining a bit of "juicy" information at one of these events. Public companies are usually as tight-lipped and as close to the vest as CIA agents guarding government secrets.

That is why it was refreshing to see Safeway (NYSE:SWY), one of the leading supermarket chains in the country, holding a pow-wow yesterday with the investment community to set the record straight. The company outlined its recent performance and its growth strategy, and even shared its financial outlook with interested listeners.

It appears that the California grocery worker strike that was resolved back in February still has legs. The work stoppage not only hurt Safeway, but it also impacted other supermarket chains such as Albertsons (NYSE:ABS) and Kroger (NYSE:KR). Safeway is now forecasting earnings for 2005 in the range of $1.50 to $1.60 per share, which excludes the $0.09 per-share impact of stock option expensing.

This new earnings range is down from the current analysts' consensus estimate of $1.67 per share; the company expects the lingering impact of the strike on its Vons stores to negatively affect earnings by $0.20 per share. Safeway expects incremental marketing expenditures of another $0.20 per share to help build back Vons' brand image.

Safeway projects same-stores sales growth for 2005 to be in the range of 1.2% to 1.5%. The company also plans to spend $1.4 billion next year to open 30 to 35 new stores and remodel an additional 275 to 285 stores. To support some of this expansion, Safeway expects to generate free cash flow of $500 million to $700 million in 2005.

The company has taken strides to differentiate its product line from its competitors, including instituting a store remodeling program, enhancing its organizational structure, and stepping up marketing efforts. Safeway's management said that "We are confident that these actions will restore growth to our business in 2005 and beyond."

Now that the company has restored internal confidence, will a logical progression toward investor confidence be achieved? While it does take time for investors to get over losing money, they nonetheless will be happy to make it back if the timing is right.

The Safeway shares, which are trading at 11 times the new 2005 earnings estimate of $1.55 per share, appear to be slightly attractive relative to the expected 12% earnings growth rate. While not a screaming buy, Safeway should be back on the investor radar for companies to watch in 2005.

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Fool contributor Phil Wohl spent over 12 years on Wall Street and does not own shares in any of the companies mentioned above.