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SPAR International

logo
legal form Corporation
founding 1932
Seat Amsterdam , North Holland , Netherlands
NetherlandsNetherlands 
management Tobias Wasmuht
Number of employees 337,000 (2015)
Branch retail trade
Website www.spar-international.com

Former Spar branch in Helsinki Central Station , now a branch of the Alepa supermarket chain is located there

Spar (spelling: SPAR ) is the world's largest voluntary association of retailers to form a retail chain who operate under the same name and with a uniform logo , but are legally independent companies ( franchise ).

The name is an acronym from the Dutch mottoD oor E endrachtig S amenwerken P rofiteren A llen R egelmatig” (German: “Everyone regularly benefits from working in harmony”) on De Spar (“The fir tree ”). As a result, the company's own brand for meat and sausage products in the German-speaking region was named Tann .

Spar Germany was taken over in 2005 by the Edeka cooperative. After that, all larger Spar stores were converted into Edeka branches. Some of the smaller Spar stores kept their names or operated under the nah & gut sales division . There are only new openings under the name and concept of Spar Express .

The SPAR Holding AG is a Swiss retail company based in the St. Gallen Gossau. In 1989 the family business acquired the Spar license for the whole of Switzerland from Spar International.

Spar Austria was founded in Austria in 1954, following the example of the Dutch Spar system. 1970 saw the merger of all ten wholesalers at the time to form Spar Österreichische Warenhandels-AG . Spar Austria is still independent and the largest savings company in the world.

history

Spar was founded in 1932 by Adriaan van Well in Zoetermeer , the Netherlands . Independent wholesalers and retailers joined together to form a voluntary retail chain.

The declared aim of this union was the "concentration of forces", which should be countered to the pressure of an ever increasing competition . All members should benefit from the interaction of these forces; the economic existence should be ensured.

Successful in the Netherlands from the start, the model quickly spread throughout Europe in the 1950s. Savings organizations were later founded in Africa, the Far East, Australia and, more recently, Moscow. In 2016, the group had over 12,200 branches, which, according to their own information, serve over 13 million customers every day.

Business types

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The Spar supermarkets offer a full range of groceries on a sales area of ​​200 (in Austria 400) to 1000 m². The fresh produce range also includes fresh meat.

Eurospar

Eurospar logo

Eurospar market in
Belfast, Northern Ireland

In addition to the range of the Spar supermarkets, the offer in the Eurospar stores also includes an expanded range of food and non-food products on a sales area of ​​1000 to 3000 m². In South Africa, markets of this size are called SuperSpar.

Interspar

Interspar logo

Interspar market at Vienna Central Station

Interspar is the largest type of Spar market. In the hypermarket run, a full range of around 40,000 items for all areas of daily life is offered on a sales area of ​​2000 to 8000 m². According to SPAR International, there are a total of 327 Interspar stores in Austria, Italy, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, China and India. '

The Interspar stores in Austria are operated by Interspar GmbH , which is a 100% subsidiary of Spar Austria . Some Interspar stores are located there in shopping centers that also belong to the Spar Austria Group. The real estate management company SPAR European Shopping Centers is the leading developer and operator of shopping centers in Austria. The Interspar headquarters for Austria is located in Salzburg-Taxham , next to the Europark shopping center , which is also operated by SPAR European Shopping Centers . The largest Interspar store in Austria is located in Vienna- Meidling and has an area of ​​almost 8,000 m². An Interspar restaurant is usually attached to the Austrian Interspar markets.

Maximarkt has been part of Interspar since 2002 .

In 1998, all Interspar stores in Germany were taken over by the US chain Wal-Mart . After Wal-Mart resold its stores to Real at the end of 2006 due to its withdrawal from Germany , most of the former Interspar stores have been run as Real department stores since then.

Spar Express

Spar Express logo

Spar Express kiosk in Frankfurt Central Station

Spar Express is a shop format that is particularly geared towards the needs of travelers on a small sales area, mostly found at airports, train stations and in city centers and thus corresponds to a convenience shop . As of the end of 2015, there were 1128 Spar-Express branches worldwide. Typical of this type of store are the extended opening times compared to the other store types.

In Germany, where Spar Express is operated by Edeka , some Jet , Esso and Shell petrol stations also sell their shops under the name Spar Express . Thus, saving Express currently the only saving format in the German market since the takeover by Edeka in 2005, which resulted in the name of saving largely disappeared in the German market.

In Austria, Spar Express is operated in the form of petrol station shops or train station shops. It is advertised with supermarket prices , but these only refer to Spar's own and exclusive brands, fruit and vegetables as well as bread and pastries in service. The prices for all other products are usually higher than in conventional Spar supermarkets.

In South Africa such markets are run under the name Kwikspar.

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Spar Gourmet in Vienna

This type of market only exists in Austria. In mid-2000, Spar Austria took over 76 Julius Meinl locations . These new locations were integrated into the Spar branch system. A new type of business - the Spar Gourmet - was launched. This specializes in exclusive groceries, while non-food items only play a subordinate role.

Development of the Spar logo

In keeping with the Dutch meaning of De Spar (dt. "The fir"), the company uses a green fir in a circle. Over the years the logo has been stylized more and more.

The final shape of today's logo was created by the designer Raymond Loewy in 1968. It should stand out with its clarity of expression and a timeless form.

The brand image is composed of three basic elements:

  • a red ribbon (with the word image SPAR)
  • followed by a green accent (the savings emblem in a green circle)
  • on a white background

Red, green and white were chosen as the basic colors, as these colors convey the impression of cleanliness and freshness according to the Group's opinion.

Structural data 2009

country Sales
(€ thousand)
Locations Area
(m²)
average
m² / location
Austria 4,907,430 1,438 1,015,000 706
Italy 3,808,378 1,636 851.073 520
South Africa 3,801,571 803 845.153 1,052
United Kingdom 3,184,225 2,577 384.225 149
Hungary 1,469,858 396 397.385 1.003
Norway 1,313,449 297 164,842 555
Ireland 1,222,427 456 122,375 268
Denmark 1,119,070 531 178.714 337
Spain 1,064,869 869 312,408 360
France 926,577 911 226.765 249
Belgium 749.949 332 143,565 432
Greece 701.979 181 131,446 726
Slovenia 678.131 80 132,974 1,662
Russia 639.327 212 106.508 502
Netherlands 523.266 320 114,879 359
Czech Republic 514.082 139 152.334 1,096
Switzerland 372.001 158 67.109 425
Germany 332.972 309 26,280 85
China 254,684 77 385.214 5,003
Croatia 185.717 13 63,580 4,891
Zimbabwe 126,660 62 33,749 544
Australia 120,825 106 42,750 403
Botswana 98,683 25th 22,514 901
Namibia 87,312 23 25,381 1.104
Japan 70.113 93 9,726 105
Poland 69,807 60 14,277 238
Zambia 41,645 9 14,473 1,608
Ukraine 38,079 28 19,608 700
India 20,982 3 9,217 3,072
Romania 18,375 14th 17,734 1,267
Mauritius 17,420 6th 5,300 883
Portugal 15,988 30th 9,750 325
Total 28,495,851 12,196 6,046,618 495 (average)

source

literature

  • Nadja v. Samson-Himmelstjerna: SPAR A German Economic History. SPAR Handelsgesellschaft mbh, 2008

See also

Web links

Commons : SPAR  - collection of images

Individual evidence

  1. a b c d SPAR International Annual Report 2015 , SPAR International, Amsterdam 2016. Accessed March 18, 2017
  2. SPAR Worldwide. In: www.spar-international.com. Retrieved March 25, 2016 .
  3. Store Formats , accessed February 26, 2017
  4. ^ Store Formats in South Africa , accessed February 26, 2017
  5. SPAR around the world ( Memento of August 18, 2011 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on October 8, 2011