This is a list of hypermarket chains sorted alphabetically by continent and country. A
hypermarket is a superstore carrying a wide range of products under one roof, and may aim to allow customers to satisfy all their shopping needs in one trip.
The Algerian chain Ardis (owned by Algerian group
Arcofina) is currently operating one hypermarket in the city of
Mohammadia, just outside
Algiers. In the future Ardis will open 19 hypermarkets in the country; the next will open near
Oran in
Bir El Djir.[1][2]Carrefour ended their partnership with the Algerian group Arcofina on February 19, 2009. "The concept of mass distribution does not work in Algeria," added Carrefour. Before that, Carrefour had still only one store opened as of 2009 of 18 hypermarkets planned by 2012. The private group Arcofina explained that there was a delay because of difficulties in finding available land for hypermarkets. Arcofina is now focusing on opening hypermarkets in the future under the Ardis brand.[3][4]
There are several hypermarkets operating in the country. The biggest are
Marjane, Aswak Assalam and
Carrefour. The Acima brand, which belongs to the same retail group with
Marjane, are stores that cannot qualify as hypermarkets because they are smaller.
The
Pick n Pay Stores chain uses the term for 14 of their largest stores in South Africa.
Checkers also runs 24 hypermarkets under the "Checkers Hyper" name.
The hypermarket format in Israel was not a success because retail chains abandoned hypermarkets and later converted them into smaller discount stores.[15]
The hypermarkets operating in Kuwait are Grand Hyper division Regency Group Dubai, which operates six hypermarkets in Kuwait, in Fahaheel, Watiya, Hawally, Jleeb al Shuwaikh, Khaithan and Hassawi, and two Grand Fresh mini supermarkets in Mangaf and Abuhalifa. Géant operates one hypermarket at 360 Mall, and six other supermarkets across the country, such as Carrefour and
City Centre. The Sultan Center has 11 locations in Kuwait that target expatriate shoppers.[26] CityCentre has two hypermarkets in Kuwait, in
Shuwaikh and
Salmiya.[27] Carrefour has one hypermarket at
The Avenues, in Shuwaikh, a few minutes out of downtown
Kuwait City.
Lulu Hypermarket is the biggest hypermarket chain in GCC, and operates six outlets in Kuwait in Al Rai, Al Qurain, Al Dajeej, Salmiya, Egaila and Fahaheel.
The country's first hypermarket will be in a 100,000 square meter shopping center, in the capital
Ashgabat, scheduled to open in 2014.[29] The complex will include the hypermarket, offices, a cinema, boutiques and a parking lot that will accommodate around 1400 cars. It is yet unknown to which retailer Turkmenistan's first hypermarket will belong.[30]
In the early 1960s, the first Superbazar (later Maxi GB and Bigg's) hypermarkets were created in Belgium in
Auderghem,
Anderlecht and
Bruges.
In 2000, the French
Carrefour Group took over the Belgian
GB Group, all Maxi GB and Bigg's hypermarket stores were then rebranded Carrefour hypermarkets.
In 2007, there were 63 hypermarkets in the country. In May 2013, there were in total 67, of which were 45 regular Carrefour hypermarkets and 15 were new Carrefour Planet hypermarkets.[35] The
Louis Delhaize Group has seven
Cora throughout
Wallonia and
Brussels.
The largest hypermarket in
Belgium is the Cora store in
Anderlecht (
Brussels) with a size of 15 000 m2.[36] The second largest is the Carrefour Planet store in the
B-Park shopping center in
Bruges (
Flanders), which has a size of 14 000 m2.[37]
Interspar (Spar Group) – in 2015, stores taken over by
Ahold and rebranded Albert
Denmark
Currently,
Bilka is the biggest chain of hypermarkets (operated by
Dansk Supermarked); the second biggest chain was
Kvickly Xtra, which were converted in 2009 to the regular Kvickly supermarkets.[39] Opening of new hypermarkets has decreased, as of 2010, due to restrictions on store sizes to protect the stores in city centers.
In France, hypermarkets are successful, and today, there are over 1000 hypermarkets in the country.
Carrefour opened the first French and European hypermarket in 1963, in
Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois near
Paris, and has 222 hypermarkets, as of 2013.[40] The largest hypermarket in France is the Carrefour store in
Villiers-en-Bière,
Seine-et-Marne (77) in the
Île-de-France region, with an area of 25 000 m2.[41]
E.Leclerc opened its first hypermarket store in 1964 in
Landerneau, near
Brest, and is now the dominant hypermarket chain in France, with 489 hypermarkets.[42] Internationally, the French Carrefour is still the largest hypermarket chain in terms of size, and second-largest (after
Walmart) in terms of revenue.
The other chains with the most hypermarkets in France are Géant (120 hypermarkets), Auchan (134) and Hyper U (61).[43]
In Corsica, hypermarkets are not as successful as in the rest of France; the only hypermarkets available in Corsica are Carrefour,
Hyper U,
E.Leclerc,
Géant and
Casino.
Mammouth – The first Mammouth store opened in 1969 near
Troyes, and the last store closed in
Lacroix-Saint-Ouen on 3 October 2009 after a 10-year delay to close the last store, as it was considered too small for an
Auchan hypermarket, but too large for an
ATAC supermarket.[45]
Rallye – first store opened in
Brest in 1968; last closed in 2002
Record – operated from 1967 to 2008; however there is a Record store still operating in
Grosbliederstroff[46]
In
Germany, the biggest hypermarket brands are Real (
METRO AG),
Kaufland (which belongs to Lidl), and
Marktkauf (which is a brand of AVA,[47] which in turn belongs to
EDEKA). However, for various reasons, such as the strong competition by more focused discounters such as
Aldi and
Lidl, as well as legal restrictions on store size,
pricing policy, and
opening times, the hypermarket concept is not as widespread in Germany as in other countries.
Wal-Mart – moved into Germany in 1997 by taking over Wertkauf stores, followed by Interspar stores the year after, but failed by trying to use its American approach in Germany; in 2006 the remaining 85 hypermarkets were changed to Real hypermarkets.
Wertkauf – first store opened in 1958 in
Karlsruhe, its
Munich store was the largest hypermarket in Europe when it opened in 1968;[48] all stores were taken over by Wal-Mart in 1997
The biggest hypermarket presence is
Tesco. Other hypermarkets include
Auchan,
Metro (Cash & Carry) and
InterSpar, which operate several hypermarkets in the country.
There are several hypermarkets, like the homegrown chain of
Maxima supermarkets in
Lithuania, which range in sizes from neighborhood convenience stores to giant supercenters or hypermarkets that stock over 65,000
SKUs. The chain has 499 (as of 2013) stores open throughout Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bulgaria (branded as T-Market) and Poland (branded as Aldik Nova).
In the
Netherlands hypermarkets were not a success; there were several attempts of retailers like
Ahold and
SHV but they all eventually failed.[49]
In 1971,
Schuitema opened their first Dutch hypermarkets,
Famila and
Ahold with Miro in
Vlissingen. In 1973,
SHV Holdings opened Trefcenter. Shortly after, Maxis was created by
De Bijenkorf. However, all these hypermarkets failed, and all closed in the 1980s.[50]
In the late 1990s, the American chain
A&P started operating supermarkets and several hypermarkets by taking over old Maxis stores. The A&P chain wasn't very successful.
C1000 took over the stores in 2000–2003, and the hypermarkets were converted to C1000 supermarkets.[51]
Since 2006, the German chain
Famila (currently operating hypermarkets in the north of
Germany and
Italy) has tried to return in the Netherlands by opening a Dutch hypermarket in
Emmen and then expanding in a few years to about 25 hypermarkets between 4,500 and 7,000 square meters. J. Bünting Beteiligungs AG from Leer (Germany) had therefore opened an office in
Drachten. However, as of 2013 there were still no Famila stores in the country.[52][53]
On March 27, 2013, the largest supermarket of the Netherlands was opened by
Jumbo in the city of
Breda, called Jumbo Foodmarkt. With around 6,000 square meters, this store can be considered a hypermarket, but does not offer non-food products, which is unlike most hypermarkets.[54][55] The second Jumbo Foodmarkt was planned to open with a size of 7,000 square meters in the unfinished Focus-U-Park
shopping center of 30,000 square meters in
Steenwijk. However, permits for construction of the Focus U Park were retracted in 2020.
There are Coop Obs! owned by
Coop Norge, which operates 24 hypermarkets through the country. Coop Norge also owns three Smart Club outlets (
Warehouse club). Other hypermarkets include EuroSpar, a hypermarket brand of
Spar, and ICA AB, with ICA Maxi stores.
In
Portugal, there are a considerable number of hypermarket chains in operation, including
Continente (the biggest and the first Portuguese chain to go international),
Auchan,
Pingo Doce,
Lidl and
Intermarché. Most of these chains also operate supermarkets and smaller stores.
There are currently two chains operating hypermarkets in the country.
Coop Switzerland owns 13 hypermarkets throughout the West, with the biggest stores situated in
Geneva and
Fribourg.[63][64] The
Migros chain has 11 MMM hypermarkets, including some in
Lausanne,
Basel, and two in France which are both near
Geneva, one in
Thoiry and
Étrembières.[65][66]
Until 22 March 2013,
Casino-Magro had several HyperCasino hypermarkets in Switzerland until the bankruptcy of the Magro group.[67]
Stores in the United States tend to be single-level enterprises with long operating hours; many of them, especially Walmart, are open 24 hours a day (except on certain holidays). The term "hypermarket" is not in general use in the US.
Warehouse stores such as
Costco and
Sam's Club are popular alternatives to discount superstores (hypermarkets) for much the same shopping requirements, requiring an annual membership, purchase of larger sizes of packaged groceries, and a more limited selection of brands and styles.
Smith's Marketplace – nameplate for hypermarkets operated by another Kroger division, Smith's Food & Drug; in a 2004 corporate reorganization, Smith's took over the Utah operations of Fred Meyer
Carrefour – opened hypermarkets in Philadelphia and Voorhees Township, New Jersey, in 1988 and 1992 respectively; both closed in 1993. Some associates wore roller skates to facilitate moving about the large building. The Voorhees location now houses a Kohl's department store, a Raymour & Flanigan furniture store, and a Marshall's discount clothing store. The Philadelphia location (an outparcel of the
Philadelphia Mills mall) housed a Walmart discount store (formerly a Bradlees; moved to a Supercenter on the former Ports Of The World/Boscov's/Steve & Barry's site) and still houses Dick's Sporting Goods and Raymour & Flanigan.
Leedmark – a joint venture involving
E.Leclerc of France; operated a single 306,000-square-foot (28,400 m2) store in
Glen Burnie, Maryland from 1991 to 1994
The Real Superstore – a division of the defunct National Tea Company, the former US subsidiary of the Canadian
Loblaws chain, which runs The
Real Canadian Superstore (see listings for Canada in the Canadian section)
The hypermarket concept was not a success in Australia.
Coles Myer had their own hypermarkets in the country with the introduction of
Super Kmart in 1983, until the results were not positive. The concept was eventually shelved by 1989 to then divide all Super Kmart stores to have a separate
Coles supermarket and a separate
Kmart discount department store.[70]
In 1984 the South African retail chain
Pick 'n Pay opened a hypermarket in the
Brisbane suburb of
Aspley. They had planned to expand to 10 hypermarkets however union bans imposed on South Africa by Australia at the time because of
Apartheid prevented the other stores from opening. In 1995 the Australian branch of Pick 'n Pay was sold to
Coles Myer and in late 2012 the Pick 'n Pay Hypermarket in Aspley would be closed and divided into an
Aldi and
Coles supermarkets as well as a
Kmart discount department store.[71]
In
New Zealand,
The Warehouse operated three hypermarkets in the
North Island between 2006 and 2009 under the "Extra" banner. These stores were closed due to poor performance.[73]
^"E.Leclerc" (in French). Archived from
the original on 4 May 2013. Retrieved 4 May 2013. 489 hypermarchés ou supermarchés Leclerc sont répertoriés sur Supermarche.com
^Gobin, Bertrand (September 2006).
"Le dernier Mammouth va disparaitre" [The last Mammouth will disappear] (PDF). Linéaires (in French) (217): 32, 33. Retrieved 4 May 2013.