The changes currently taking place in the Swedish grocery industry are historic. Where is this development going?

What is going on right now in Sweden is brutal. A couple of months ago, Lidl overtook ICA Sweden’s hypermarket chain Maxi in terms of customer numbers, and thus the chain is in second spot following another discount  chain, Willy’s. At the same time, the new Coop discount concept Xtra is growing rapidly and now reaches 5% of all households with the chain’s 50 stores. Discount is on a roll and overtaking traditional retail markets. Two years ago the fastest growing segment was home-delivery of grocery products, and  now this is in deep crisis. Inflation is still at a historically high level, even though the rate was slightly lower in March, and  the grocery trade has had a negative sales trend since March 2022.

Higher prices have clearly changed consumer buying behaviour. They buy cheaper or fewer goods, which means that the price-adjusted sales trend is strongly negative. The biggest trend right now is “low prices”.