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Vienna. At his office in Sattledt, Upper Austria, Günther Helm does not often sit. Last week, the boss Hofer in Slovenia, next week, he visited some of its 130 Hungarian branches. He is just walking through a newly opened Venetian shop. Aldi stands above the entrance to the branch, which the architects have kept in soft colors, stone and lots of glbad. But behind Aldi is Sattledt – and behind him Günther Helm, who heads the international affairs of the German discounter.
Whether in Vienna or Veneto, these are always the same keywords used by the general manager of Hofer: freshness, transparency, regionality, You offer a smart instead of a hard discount. It does not only pursue the strategy in Italy, where the company has opened 30 branches in the last three months and can imagine "a few hundred". But the shop near Venice with its ripe melons, figs, Parma ham and Tuscan cantuccini is a good indication of the direction of the trip. This will have nothing to do with the sterile halls and a few hundred cheap items on pallets with which the Austrian Helmut Hofer began 50 years ago.
The good price of the good neighbor
more now, "says Helm, you have to give more to people, who, after a long career as Regional Sales Manager, came to the board three years ago, offers just about everything: Hofer cares about the protection of the environment, bees, animal welfare, produces and consumes plastic bags and palm oil in front of. "We want to be a good neighbor, a good citizen, the friendly, "says Helm.
In Austria, the company took the strategy to 487 agencies and 21% of market share.For the brands, Hofer is behind Spar and ahead of Billa.The clbadic supermarkets complain about the subsidiary of Aldi-Süd and its competitor Lidl, which supplies them with organic and regional products, fresh bread, coffee and cheap clean brands. "Together, Hofer and Lidl today, as a kind of cheaper supermarkets with thin items, represent pr s 30 percent of the Austrian food trade. The headset itself is just as hard to find as investments or profits or the annual turnover of 4.1 billion euros. "With the numbers, we do not have it," he says.
The attitude is also due to the German buttoned parent company. Thus, only a few people know that all of Aldi Süd's international activities converge in Helm's office in Sattledt and in a second growing headquarters in Salzburg. The boss of Hofer is responsible for about 900 branches and more than 20,000 employees in Austria, Switzerland, Slovenia, Hungary and now Italy. In addition, Helm is the last resort for markets as large as the United States, Australia, China, the United Kingdom and Ireland. According to the company, a branch opens every day somewhere in the world. "I do not decide where it will be built in California," says Helm. "Otherwise, I'll sit in the plane."
Discrete Test Balloons
California employees must also adhere to two internal rules: "We only work with anyone who is interested only in maximizing profits." And if someone pay, it's not a sustainable business model, and we will not do it. "So there's still no customer card – otherwise Hofer could not offer the same price at all the world – and no online shop.Here up there, the discounter saw the supplies of other interested supermarkets, but kept trading with loss with food orders but far Amazon – a main reason for starting Numerous Numerous Competitors – "You Must Observe," says Helm.
Inactive his company is not about the subject of online trading, even if that seems to be the case. At the moment, test balls are rising all over the world – voluntarily discrete.In Austria, Hofer li Nowadays, bulky appliances such as infrared booths in their homes, in the UK they are wines. In China, Aldi's mother went the other way and sells groceries to Chinese customers via Amazonian rival Alibaba since 2017, before there was only one branch. . When you want to start with food, the headphones do not say. Only: "It does not happen by accident."
("Die Presse", printed edition, 05.07.2018)
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