Italian regional grocery retailer Gruppo Arena has completed the purchase of 33 supermarkets in Sicily from Auchan Retail.
The transaction has been formally closed, and the stores have now been transferred to Gruppo Arena, following approval from the relevant competition authorities, Auchan said in a statement.
The 33 stores were not included in the prior sale of Auchan’s Italian assets to Conad.
Gruppo Arena has taken on all 800 employees working in the stores, which operated under the Simply, IperSimply and PuntoSimply banners.
The stores are located in Catania (11 stores), Messina and Palermo (6 each), Siracusa and Mascalucia (2 each), and Bagheria, Priolo, Lentini, Acireale, Riposto, and San Agata di Militello (one each).
Rebranding Process
Nineteen stores will be rebranded under Gruppo Arena’s Deco supermarket banner, with €100 million being allocated to restructuring the stores and expanding the network over the coming year.
However, the remaining 14 smaller-sized stores, deemed as non-strategic, will be passed on to Gruppo Radenza and operate under the Crai banner.
M&A Activity
This is the latest in a flurry of acquisitions for Gruppo Arena, which also recently acquired 11 stores from Gruppo Abate and eight from Gruppo Cambria.
These deals are expected to boost Gruppo Arena’s annual turnover to over €1 billion by 2020.
As a result of this transaction, Gruppo Arena becomes the leader in the large-scale retail trade in Sicily in terms of market share, with over 200 stores.
The retailer operates four store banners: Decò (supermarkets and superstores), IperConveniente (over 2,000 square metres), SuperConveniente (1500-1800 square metres) and Non Solo Cash.
© 2019 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Branislav Pekic. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine
