Finnish retail giant K Group has announced that its market share in the grocery trade grew by 0.4 percentage points to 36.5% in 2019, citing data from Nielsen’s Grocery Shop Directory, which was published on 19 March.
Growth was mainly driven by strong performance in the group's K-Citymarket and K-Supermarket chains, with the former seeing the biggest gain in market share among all grocery chains in the country.
The retail group also emerged as the only operator in the Finnish grocery trade to increase its market share in 2019.
Growth Driver
President of K Group’s grocery trade division, Ari Akseli, explained, “The strong growth was attributable to our efforts towards producing an excellent customer experience, an objective that is at the core of everything we do.
“Again, K-food retailers played a key role in modernising the Finnish grocery trade offering last year, making K Group even more distinctly a pioneer in the trading sector.”
K-Citymarkets and K-Supermarkets outpaced the grocery trade market average in terms of sales growth, according to Nielsen’s Grocery Shop Directory.
Sales in the retailer’s K-Citymarket chain saw growth of 5.1%.
Akseli added, “Our remodelled stores and store-specific business ideas – meaning tailoring the selection and services of each K-store based on customer data and the retailer’s customer understanding – have proven an effective combination.”
Last year, K-Citymarket Järvenpää won the prestigious 'Store of the Year' Award 2019 at the IGD Awards in London.
Online Performance
Online grocery sales at Kesko increased by 56.7% in 2019, data showed, amounting to nearly €110 million.
“More than 250 K-food stores now offer online sales. Online customer numbers have doubled and customer satisfaction is very high,” Akseli said.
“Improved customer satisfaction in both our physical and online stores clearly shows that we are focusing on the right things. We are heading in the right direction, and will continue our efforts to serve our customers even better every day.”
Nielsen’s Grocery Shop Directory is published annually and reports on the grocery trade market as a whole, covering the sales of physical and online stores selling groceries.
© 2020 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Dayeeta Das. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
