Netto (store)

For other meanings of "netto", see Netto (disambiguation). For other unrelated supermarket chains with the same names, see Netto (Les Mousquetaires) and Netto Marken-Discount.

Netto

Type	Private
Industry	Retail
Genre	Supermarket
Founded	Copenhagen, Denmark
Headquarters	Køge, Denmark
Area served	Europe
Revenue	23 Billion DKK
Employees	7000
Parent	Dansk Supermarked Group
Website	http://www.netto.dk

Netto is a Danish discount supermarket operating in several European countries. Netto is owned by Dansk Supermarked Group, which in turn is partly owned by A.P. Møller-Mærsk Group.

Netto also operates an express version of the store, known as Døgn Netto. Døgn stores offer the same service as regular Netto stores, with longer opening hours and higher prices.

2009 saw Netto celebrate its 28th birthday with special offers in store in the weeks number 16, 17 and 18 every year.

Geographic coverage

At the end of January 2012, Netto had stores in the following countries:

Country	Since	Stores
Denmark	1981	430
Germany	1990	333
Poland	1995	224
Sweden	2002	138

On 27 May 2010 it was announced that Netto would sell all UK stores to Asda for £778M.

Denmark

A Netto store at Lygten, in Copenhagen

The first Netto store opened in Copenhagen, Denmark in 1981. At first the items sat in boxes and on pallets, but the chain quickly expanded, and the service level increased as well. Today there are 406 stores (February 2010).

A Døgn Netto in Copenhagen

The very first Netto opened in 1979, it was "red" instead of "yellow", and was called NETTOmarked.

Germany

German Netto

In September 1990, Netto started an internationalisation process, and Germany was the second country to gain Netto stores. The first store was opened in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern not long after the Fall of the Wall. Netto has since expanded in the states of Brandenburg, Berlin, Saxony-Anhalt and Schleswig-Holstein, and there are a total of 293 stores end of May 2009.

In Germany, a second chain of stores, called Netto Marken-Discount and owned by EDEKA has also been in operation since 1984. The two chains are unrelated to each other.

United Kingdom

British Netto

Netto began operating in England in Leeds on 13 December 1990, with the company's UK headquarters being based in the ex-mining village of South Elmsall, West Yorkshire. Netto primarily expanded in central England, before moving south into London. There were a total of 194 stores in the UK, all in England and Wales.

Plans for a £200M investment in 70 stores in South Wales were cancelled due to logistical issues, resulting in the sell-off of stores in Barry and Caerphilly. Four stores were opened in North Wales in Holyhead, Llandudno Junction, Flint and Caernarfon.

Many prices were very similar to wholesale prices, in a style and concept closest to the now defunct Kwik Save brand. To enforce fairness to all shoppers, many offers were limited to 6 per person. Netto sold brand-name products, such as Pepsi and Walkers Crisps which were often parallel imports.

In May 2010, Netto UK was bought by Asda for £778m to increase its smaller store portfolio. The rebranding of 147 former UK Netto stores under the Asda name was complete by the end of the summer of 2011. Competition laws required Asda to sell the remaining 47 stores to other companies such as Morrisons, new convenience store UGO, and other retailers.

On 30 September 2011, Netto UK ceased trading.

Poland

Polish Netto

The first Netto store in Poland opened in Szczecin in 1995. The expansion of the branch is concentrated in the west part of the country from Szczecin to Gdańsk (for example in Police and Stargard Szczeciński), and through the country to Bydgoszcz, Poznań, and Zielona Góra, and the country has 212 stores today.

Sweden

Swedish Netto

The Swedish part of Netto was founded in 2002 as a joint venture between Dansk Supermarked and ICA called Netto Marknad AB. The co-operation was granted by the European Commission in 2001. The headquarters were established in Halmstad in March and the first store was opened in Trelleborg on May 8. A week later two stores where opened in Lund. In the beginning, Netto kept their stores in the Götaland region.

In August 2004 the first stores in Stockholm were opened. The head office moved to Falkenberg in October 2003.

The Swedish Netto branch is expanding rapidly. As of 2003 there were 28 stores. One year later there were 58 stores and as of December 2007 the store count is 84 and of May 2009 there are 107 stores.

At the end of 2006 ICA announced it was pulling out of the joint venture, reducing its stake from 50% to 5%. 21 stores in the Stockholm and Västerås regions would transfer to ICA ownership with most being rebranded to ICA's own formats during 2007. The reasons for the change were problems in supplying the stores based on Netto's more southern base as well as ICA's desire to focus investment on its own formats.

Other countries

The Netto name is also used in other countries such as Spain and France, but these stores are independent from the Scandinavian Netto. The Spanish Netto is a chain of convenience stores owned by DinoSol and the French Netto is a discount chain owned by Les Mousquetaires.

See also

• List of supermarket chains
• Aldi
• Lidl
• List of supermarket chains in the United Kingdom
• Asda

Further reading

• Information regarding the locations of the Danish owned Netto
• Information regarding ICA's withdrawal from Netto in Sweden

External links

• Danish homepage
• Døgn Netto page
• German homepage
• UK homepage
• Swedish homepage
• Polish homepage