After several years of declining customer base, Rema has finally won the battle for customers during the current coronavirus crisis. In March, the chain increased its market share by 0.3 per cent.
According to Dagens Næringsliv, Rema increased its market share from 23.3 to 23.6 per cent in March. Competitors Norgesgruppen, Coop, and Bunnpris had a corresponding overall fall of 0.3 percentage points in market shares.
Although the changes in percentage points may look small, they make up large sums. In 2019, groceries in Norway were sold for 178 billion kroner, according to the Nielsen analysis agency.
In recent years, Rema has lost market share in the battle for low-budget customers and in 2016 had a market share of 24.4 percent.
A possible turning point
Rema chief Trond Bentestuen told the newspaper that the development in the past month may be a turning point.
“Yes maybe. There has been a different situation where parts of the turnover from hotels, restaurants, and cafes have moved to the grocery market. In addition, the Swedish shopping trend is gone,” he explained
Rema’s growth in March came as a result of Kiwi’s cutting prices for 200 items by 20 percent last Friday. Kiwi estimates that the price cut will cost around 200 million kroner.
Coop responded to Kiwi’s price war, saying they would cut prices on the same 200 items as Kiwi, in addition to 25 other items. Rema then said that they too would find the same, low prices that their competitors were advertising.
Rema won the VG food exchange
In the VG Food Exchange, which was published on Thursday, Rema had the lowest overall price in a 43-item price check at the three low-price competitors.
These items cost 8.70 kroner less than at Kiwi and 24.33 kroner less than at Coop Extra.
© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today
I love Rema’s salmon with mashed potatoes meals in the green boxes, and the stores are often out of it. The other fish combinations in the orange and blue boxes aren’t as good and are the last to disappear.
I sometimes pick up the Swedish *chocolate* oat drink at Rema, but it is way over-priced, and I’m a pensjonist.
Rema’s very reasonably priced pre-cooked chicken leg&thigh packages are OK, but the seasoning on them is BLECH!
We siblings have my mom’s chicken & rice recipe which uses Wishbone’s excellent “Russian” salad, sandwich, and barbecue dressing in the fantastic sauce, but of course Wishbone dressing isn’t available over here. :-/ … and I’ve just discovered the past due date of the bottle my family (expensively) mailed is/was 24 March 2018! 🙁
And too often, my usual Rema store has run out of those excellent little round 20 kroner eplekaker/apple cakes.
Also, Rema doesn’t have the extreme 180g Nadir and 200g milk chocolate bar sales – 4 for 100 kroner – that EuroPris, Joker, and Coop Obs often have … which – in the absence of Hershey’s with Almonds 6-packs … *sales* – are VITAL for morale during self-isolation.
And Jacob’s and Meny stopped carrying American A&W ROOT BEER, albeit at extortionate prices. (I had never heard of the White Rock alternative, and after a can or 2 I understood why.)
And Tigr stopped carrying American M&Ms Plain and Peanuts, even though it couldn’t keep them on the shelves, they were selling so fast. (Candy monopoly here in Norway?)
And we can’t get Nabisco Honey Maid Graham Crackers for dunk-in-milk over here!
And we don’t have Saltine crackers! (Any American girl over here who discovers she’s pregnant *immediately* panicks to wire home for a box to be air-mailed to prevent morning sickness. (If a girl has about 3 with water before getting out of bed in the morning, that usually deters morning sickness.))
When we were briefly living back in little Macomb Illinois … out in the sticks … in the middle of OCEANS of corn/mais … my young Norwegian ex-wife could not BELIEVE the variety/*selection* in our supermarkets. Here in the supermarkets, your choice of soap is Norwegian Lano, Dove (having a scent apparently intended to repel), and the neutral/natural/pure soap. I got a great flower-scented bar of soap down in Roma last summer, but that’s about used up. :-/
Norway’s supermarkets need to find out what’s good/liked in the *world*. Onion rings seem to have caught on only because of the Burger Kings here … which back home of course have ROOT BEER.