Jumbo range is becoming increasingly Belgian

Dutch supermarket chain Jumbo is increasingly stocking its Belgian stores with local products and brands: “We want to entice and surprise our customers.” Belgian suppliers can also move into the Dutch market.

4,000 unique Belgian items

“With 44 stores, we now have sufficient volume to offer a full Belgian range, which can also be rolled out to the Netherlands in the long term”, Peter Isaac, director of Jumbo Belgium, said during a presentation of the supermarket chain’s Christmas range to the press on Thursday at the Jumbo Foodmarkt in Ghent.

The CEO wants to add nuance to recent complaint by food federation Fevia that the advance of Dutch retail chains in Flanders is putting pressure on the share of Belgian food and beverages in shopping carts. The Jumbo range already includes 4,000 unique Belgian items, he says. For example, the supermarket chain sells a lot of private label products that may not be immediately recognisable as Belgian, but which are indeed produced in Belgium. These could also be rolled out to Dutch stores if there is interest.

Surprising flavors

This festive season, new range of fresh tapas under the premium Jumbo’s own brand was added, featuring 32is references – all made in Belgium, including familiar varieties such as olives and hummus, as well as surprising flavours such as aioli with crispy chili oil, baba ganoush, labneh vadouvan and goat cheese spread with beetroot. The range will vary even more after the holidays. The range of hot oven snacks – another typical Belgian phenomenon – has also been upgraded.

Dutch colleagues have already come to take a look: the aperitif moment is not nearly as popular in the Netherlands, but there may be potential. The tapas are not explicitly recognisable as Belgian, but some other products are: Belgian flags appear on the packaging in the pastry and meat counters, among others.

“We’re not copying anyone”

This festive season, Jumbo also wants to focus on convenience, with fresh filled Italian pasta, fish verrines, salmon carpaccio, salmon rolls filled with scallops, or capon stuffed with chestnuts and figs, ready to go in the oven. To finish off, there is, for example, a moelleux dessert cake that you can decorate yourself. The approach is “not too complex and affordable.” The entire range is featured in a 56-page holiday magazine specifically for Belgium. After all, the coming weeks are particularly important for supermarkets. In the Netherlands, festivities are pretty much over after Christmas — on New Year’s Eve, it’s just “oliebollen” (fried doughnuts) — but Belgians continue to celebrate into January.

During a tour of the store, Isaac points out the “unique” range of frozen meals, which includes a range of high-protein meals. “We are not just about price, we are also about the range. We want to reassure customers about the price by matching our price level with that of competitors such as Colruyt and Albert Heijn, but we also want to surprise and entice customers. And we do that our way: we don’t copy anyone.”

Jumbo opened seven new stores in Belgium this year. Next year, the retailer is aiming for six additional locations.