ICA AB
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| ICA AB | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Type | |
| Genre | Grocery |
| Founded | 1938 |
| Headquarters | , Sweden |
| Website | ICA Webpage |
ICA AB (Inköpscentralernas aktiebolag) is a Swedish corporate group in the grocery business. The company was started in 1938, based on a business model which was introduced by Hakonbolagen in 1917. Most of its operations are based in Scandinavia, and the company is the largest retail company in the Nordic countries.
The company was owned by the participating retailers until 2000 when half of the company was sold to the Dutch retailer Ahold. Ahold is prevented by contractual obligation from exercising majority control over ICA even if it should acquire a majority of the shares.
Contents |
[edit] Sweden
In Sweden, ICA Sverige AB operates 1,668 retail stores as of 2003. The stores have different profiles, depending on location, range of products and size:
- ICA Nära ("ICA Near-by") — Convenience-type stores for daily retail needs.
- ICA Supermarket — Mid-size supermarkets, located near where customers dwell or work carrying a wide range of products.
- ICA Kvantum — Superstores for large, planned, purchases. Large spaces allocated for traffic and parking. Typically located outside of the cities.
- MAXI ICA Stormarknad — Hypermarkets with a full range of groceries as well as fashions, homewares, entertainment and electrical. Smaller stores do not offer the fashion and electrical ranges while the largest stores also have a DIY and gardening department.
Each store is owned and operated separately, but operations are coordinated within the group. All feature ICA brand products.
During 2003, ICA Sverige AB had a turnover of 78 billion SEK (including VAT). A major ICA location is in Västerås, where they have a logistics center.
[edit] ICA meat repackaging controversy
In December 2007, a meat repackaging fraud scheme was made known to the public. Hans Hallén, a former quality control manager for supermarket chain ICA has revealed that the company knew that meat was being illegally repackaged as early as 2003. Hans Hallén, who monitored ICA stores in southern Sweden from 2003-2005, said he had informed the company's managers of the exact practices that were exposed on December 5, 2007 by the Sveriges Television in its weekly investigative television programme Uppdrag granskning. According to Hallén, many stores engaged in practices such as repackaging meat in order to change the best before date.
[edit] Norway
ICA Norge AS runs 1,028 stores in Norway as of 2003. Turnover for the same year was 23 billion NOK (excluding VAT). Formerly know as Hakongruppen and owned by Stein Erik Hagen, it operated solely RIMI discount stores until ICA bought the chain, and transformed many of the stores to the ICA brand. After the take-over ICA has been losing market shares in Norway. ICA Norway is divided into four different stores:
- ICA Nær
- ICA Supermarked
- ICA Maxi
- RIMI (a chain of discount food stores)
[edit] Rimi Baltic
ICA's wholly owned subsidiary Rimi Baltic operates discount stores, supermarkets and hypermarkets across Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
[edit] Statoil
Until the mid 1990s, Statoil and ICA jointly operated Statoil Detaljhandel AB (Statoil Retail Ltd) which ran approximately 1,300 petrol stations in Scandinavia, many branded under the name ICA Express. ICA has since sold its 50 percent share of the business back to Statoil and the ICA name was removed from the petrol stations during 2007.
[edit] Denmark
ICA previously had a 50 percent stake in the ISO chain of supermarkets in the Copenhagen region, Denmark. In 2004, ICA sold its entire holding in ISO.
[edit] Netto Sweden
The Swedish operation of Danish supermarket chain Netto was founded in 2002 as a joint venture between Dansk Supermarked and ICA. The joint venture was named Netto Marknad AB. At the end of 2006, ICA announced it was pulling out of the joint venture, reducing its stake from 50 to 5 percent. Twenty-one of the Netto stores in the Stockholm and Västmanland regions were transferred to ICA's ownership and rebranded to ICA's own formats or closed during 2007.
