A map of European supermarkets

fuck supermarkets

Fuck them all. Buy local, or from smaller companies.
- I try to. But fucking hell, Maxima and Lidl sometimes have so much better prices. Though to be fair, it's usually because of the fact that they sell more foreign foodstuffs while the local companies sell more local stuff. So buying cheap stuff from Maxima or Lidl is a double whammy to the local economy. Which is why I haven't been to Lidl in like half a year. Maxima at least has local products too
  And to be clear, even the local alternatives are supermarkets generally. Very few small independent stores are left and the ones that do still exist are usually significantly more expensive and don't carry a lot of stuff.

Norwegians don't shop food.

Tesco can fuck off though. Price increases during the pandemic and the profits when up way more than that, indicating greed.
They also force you to have a club card otherwise pretty much every item in the store costs more money.
Edit: Also, why isn’t Asda on this list? It’s owned by a couple of brothers from the UK now. Not that it’s any better than Tesco.
- Tbf, I think all of them took advantage of COVID to some extent
  The card thing is annoying though. Tesco seemed to have pioneered it, and now Morrisons and the Co-op seems to be doing the same. Not sure about others.
  Morrisons, Sainsbury's, M&S also aren't on the list, actually. But then again I don't think I've ever seen them outside the UK, so maybe that's why.
  E: I've been told elsewhere that Morrisons was taken over by a US equity firm.
- I thought it was owned by Walmart tbh, but apparently they sold most of it. They still retain 10% shares though.
  
  Yeah it was sold a few years ago to a couple of brothers who made their money in petrol forecourts.
  Interesting it’s people like this I really don’t understand. Like if I had a fraction of the money to be able to buy Asda, I’m going to retire and enjoy my hobbies. I don’t get how you would want to make more money.

I shop at Aldi and Lidl too but let's not fool ourselves into thinking these are good alternatives. These companies are part of the problem and not part of the solution.

Aldi has left Denmark so the map is a bit outdated.

They suck.
Coops tend to be far better.
- And they give eggs :)

Spar, that is basically Global now
And Billa is Rewe, including: Penny, Nahkauf, Adeg, BIPA, Toom, DER, ...

where Spar?

Auchan still operates in russia. https://leave-russia.org/auchan

Metro is B2B-only in Belgium, their B2C stores (Makro) no longer exist.
Think they're B2B in Germany as well.
- In Czechia, you need to legally be an entrepreneur/bussines to get the free Makro membership to shop there.
  
  Yeah, you need a VAT number.
  It used to be like that in Makro as well, but people basically would use the data of some self-employed uncle to get cards for the entire family, so they dropped the VAT-restriction (but card was still mandatory)
- Think they’re B2B in Germany as well.
  You are correct
- My whole childhood was spent at the Makro, sad that it's gone
- Same in France

Maxima needs to expand to more countries, honestly. I visit Lithuania regularly and I love that store.
- we call it mahima here since it's usually frequented by occupants and staffed by people who can't speak the local language. Despite that it has good prices and one of the best kitchens of any big market. Just annoying to shop with some babushkas who act like their kgb officer husband is still alive.
- I'm from Latvia originally, Maxima should fucking die.
  
  It’s far far cheaper than Rimi tho. Those guys rip you off.

Lidl’s got their fucking ground covered. They are not even just in Europe. They’re a major brand even in the USA. Same with Aldi. These two cheap discounters are not messing around.
Small hint: it should be Aldi Süd. Not Sud.
Sud is disgusting (basically meat juice) while Süd is a „direction“.
- In my town (in America) there is literally a lidl and aldi across the street from each other
  I like to imagine the staff get into fights
  
  They probably couldn’t care less about that sort of rivalry lol. They just go there to earn money. If anything I imagine they spend their breaks together.
  
  They probably do dance-offs.
- Sued
  
  Rejected
- Aldi in the US https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vT5-cV4oMY8&t=19s&pp=ygUIV3NqIGFsZGk%3D
  
  Looks so nice tbh. Aldis in Germany (not Aldi Süd, I have Aldi Nord which is different and separate) are ugly as hell lol. I hate shopping at Aldi in Germany.

Not sure I'd push Tesco as a great company. They are pioneers of data collection through the Clubcard and absolutely hammer you on price if you don't have one.
- That is sadly a trend I witness heavily here. Have a card or pay a lot more. Except Aldi they all do that now. You can't trust any discount-signs anymore as they all have a Lil footnote á LA "only with our app". Boycotting this trend seems to be hard 😔
  
  It's easy for me. It's part of the reason I only shop at Aldi
- As someone who doesn’t have a club card and never will. I do have to shop in Tesco occasionally for smaller things but I have noticed the savings aren’t as much anymore. This is not to justify it, I think there was a big push to get your data and now they have it, they are rolling back to the benefits.
  Not that the prices were that great anyway, just brought things down to normal prices.
  Edit - also screw you sainsburys for exactly the same thing.
  
  It's not really a benefit though, club card gets the normal price and without you pay extra

Auchan is one of the shadiest there is. Still operating in Russia with no intention of leaving.
In Portugal I usually stick to Continente or Pingo Doce (both Portuguese capital owned, I think), and sometimes Lidl for some products that are only sold there.
- Oh, and Normal (which I think is scandi) is really good to buy name brands.

Some patterns jump out:
None of them have presence in Norway.
They all skip Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, and North Macedonia.
But some are in Croatia.
Curious, why?
- I think most countries also have a local chain that is not here, there are many more companies where you can get groceries than mentioned here, also big companies that operate in 1 or 2 countries.
- the countries listed at 2 hardly compare to croatia in most things. croatia has a thriving tourism industry and more money. they just skip the worst-off part of europe
- Between Coop, Rema and Norgesgruppen(Meny, Kiwi, Spar etc.) nobody have really been able to establish themselves. Lidl tried but only laster a couple years or so.
- Also Norway is not part of the EU or the customs union. Together with pretty harsh tariffs on agricultural products in direct competition with Norwegian agriculture. Lidl couldn't import and dump prices on staple products in meat and dairy. They also had stores that was so different from what we were used to it alienated lots of customers. Not a big loss tbh, it's a shite chain anyway.
  That being said there are issues with this sector in Norway with three operators with more and more vertical integration. No real competition
- Well, in Norway we have a cartel/triopoly which is not good. Lidl tried to establish here, but were quickly squeezed out of competition.
  
  Sounds like our situation here in Sweden (ICA, coop, Axfood).

None of these chains are present in Norway. Lidl tried years ago and gave up. We only have some Norwegian chains here.
- Interesting enough, the chains in this graphic that operate in Germany are German. Apart from some small outlets, the German market is controlled by German chains. It's just that these also became relatively successful internationally.
  
  Aldi is really successful in the US now https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vT5-cV4oMY8&t=19s&pp=ygUIV3NqIGFsZGk%3D
- Norway has SPAR, right?
  
  We do, but in an odd way. One of the Norwegian chains use Spar as a brand for some of their stores.

Auchan left Italy years ago

I feel like it would maybe be more useful to see which American chains, if any, operate in Europe.
It seems half the supermarkets here in Dennark are Norwegian chains, for some reason. Not sure if there are any non-European ones around.
- This map is still useful to remind everyone that Auchan is an amoral American style corporation that keeps doing doing it's best to keep a fascist country attacking Europe well supplied.
  
  Isn't it the same for Metro?

Aldi Süd and Nord are not really the same chain
- Recently, they started cooperating more and their distribution is mutually exclusive. Yet, it might be better to have them in different colours.
  
  Ah interesting. Maybe the families made up.

Aldi left Denmark about a year ago. Might have been more.

are there any supermarkets in Europe that are not European?
- Apparently Morrisons in the UK is American
  
  Not sure where you heard that, it's headquartered in the UK, founded by a man from Yorkshire, and the current CEO is French.
- Well, Walmart tried
- aldi and lidl created a fierce competition. I've seen walmart and spar straight up give up and leave. apparently they couldn't compete. later aldi expanded to the US
  
  Spar is Dutch. I live close to the border and there used to be a Spar store but it is a Jumbo store now, also Dutch. And then of course there is Albert Hein. So it seems like Dutch people can handle the competition pretty well actually.
  
  In the UK we now have Tesco and Asda saying they will price match a few Aldi products. Few others might do this occasionally as well.
  Aldi responded with saying they price match Aldi on all their products.

As an American, I love aldis

Poland's gonna get them all!
- Is Billa a franchise? If it is, I would open one in Poland, just to finish the collection.
  
  We had Billa branded stores ca. 2006.

Or perhaps use local shops instead of supermarkets...?
- Unfortunately they cost a lot more or often don't exist.
  Plus, many of us are over-stressed and overworked as is. Going to 5 different places to buy your stuff was a lot easier back in the days when most things were in walking distance and only one person in the household had to work full time.
- Supermarkets put most of them out of business.
- Because the local shop doesn't sell pork shoulder for £3.79/KG
- they're too expensive for most of us
- What do you mean? I'm not sure I know of any "local shops" or what that means precisely or how that's different from a supermarket exactly.
  To me there's grocery stores like Tesco's and Sainsbury's and the rest of these seem to be in line with that.
  Do you mean like corner shops/stores like an off-licence?
  
  A local shop for local people
  They probably mean some local chain or small independent store. Usually more expensive and have fewer items though.
- Lol, this is great in theory but the supermarkets ensured most went bust years ago, we have one butcher in the village everyone else went years ago, no veg or anything else

dont forget the different Nettos. looks like scandinavia is free of supermarkets.
- Coop bought out Netto in Sweden, so it would be gray for that map too.
  
  we still have two nettos and its very confusing. https://www.supermarktblog.com/2013/04/19/schnell-erklaert-das-doppelte-nettochen/

Love how Metro has Switzerland and Slovenia surrounded.

Mercadona ftw!
- Isn't the CEO of Mercadona financing the far right in Spain Vox party? Did you wonder why Mercadona only hires spanish people, only to treat them like shit later anyway? Also all this unfaithful practices they did to fuck up competition and all the increase of prices even when the government reduced the tax...
  Man, fuck Mercadona.
  
  But but but... It's European!
  
  Not only that but a lot of products (food especially, except meat) are really bad (both in Portugal and in Spain).

Coop. It's cooperative. Get your membership today.
- We have those in Italy (all.coop). However, the biggest one (coopalleanza3-0.it) seems to be up to mischiefs lately (asking for location on page load, strange customer points programmes, …)

Continente, Pingo Doce probably only exist in Portugal