Kantar Retail reveals Rising Stars of Retail

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--B&M, Leclerc, Waitrose and Amazon are among Europe’s 15 Rising Stars of retail who are predicted to challenge the more established retailers such as Tesco and Carrefour in the next 10-15 years, according to Kantar Retail.

Rising Stars understand their strengths and how to exploit them to successfully attract today’s more agile shopper. While a multichannel approach is commonly seen as the best way forward for retailers, many of the fastest-growing and impactful operators today have little or no multichannel presence: businesses such as Lidl, Jumbo and BIM trade through rapidly expanding and differentiated store chains that offer shoppers ‘real value’.

Many of the Rising Stars are privately-, employee- or family-owned businesses, meaning that they are not under pressure for immediate results from shareholders and can concentrate on medium- and long-term strategies.

Kantar Retail’s top industry thought leaders Bryan Roberts and Bryan Gildenberg revealed the Rising Stars at the international Shopper Insights in Action event in Amsterdam on Thursday 25 October.

The up-and-coming challengers in Europe – in no particular order – are:

• Aldi (Germany)
• Amazon (USA)
• B&M (UK)
• Biedronka (Poland)
• BIM (Turkey)
• Booker (UK)
• Colruyt (Belgium)
• DM (Germany)
• Eurospin (Italy)
• Jumbo (Netherlands)
• Leclerc (France)
• Lidl (Germany)
• Mercadona (Spain)
• Ocado (UK)
• Waitrose (UK)

The world’s leading shopper and retail insights and consulting business revealed that the Rising Stars tend to share one or more of the following characteristics:

• Proximity – shoppers increasingly value shopping in stores closer to where they live or work
• Disruptiveness – while it has yet to make a profit, rapidly-growing online grocer Ocado has punched above its wait in terms of disrupting shopping trips and impacting larger supermarket competitors. The disruption caused by Amazon, meanwhile, is only just beginning
• Smaller store formats – hypermarket sales are under pressure across many European markets and the likes of Carrefour and Tesco are now prioritising smaller store concepts to dive growth and profitability
• Efficiency – the likes of Mercadona and Aldi are brutally efficient throughput the value chain
• Strong private labels – providing value, but not necessarily at a low price (e.g. Waitrose)
• Differentiation – new successful stores physically look different to other stores

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