Carrefour has had a fairly solid third quarter, with improving results for France, Belgium and Brazil. The company’s e-commerce activities are also growing strongly, but Spain and Italy still struggle.
Hypermarkets stabilise
The French retailer realized a turnover of more than 21 billion euro in the third quarter, a growth of 2.1 % on a comparable basis. The improvement of the results in France, where the hypermarkets managed to stabilize sales after the decreasing turnover of the past quarters, spells good news for Carrefour. Supermarkets and convenience stores improved as well.
For Belgium, too, the results are better than in the difficult first half of the year, with a comparable growth of 0.5 % and a turnover of 1.1 billion euro. Sales in the first nine months of the year amounted to 3.1 billion, which is still a decline of 1.1 % due to a series of strikes. Elsewhere in Europe there was growth in Poland and Romania, but a decrease in Spain (-2.7 %) and Italy (-4.4 %). The retailer also sees improvement in Latin America, Asia and online, the latter growing by more than 30 %.
‘Act for Food’
The press statement also emphasizes the strong progress that the group is making with its transformation plan Carrefour 2022: omnichannel is being expanded in all markets, just like the private label range. Hypermarkets are reducing their store surface and especially their non-food range. In Belgium, five hypermarkets are being converted into supermarkets by the end of November.
The retailer also invests in smaller convenience stores, the plan to improve operational efficiency is on schedule and the Act for Food program has expanded internationally. The purchasing alliances with Système U and Tesco have recently become operational and will visibly contribute to the results from next year, the company promises.
