Learning from the leaders: lessons in best practice from Europe’s winning hypermarkets

Europe’s hypermarket sector has come a long way since the first SuperBazar opened in Brussels back in 1961. From a single store covering a relatively lowly 3,300 square meters¹, hypermarkets have grown to become one of the continent’s key retail pillars. In 2024 alone, hypermarkets generated an estimated $3.2 trillion in revenues, testament to the incredible appeal they have to shoppers Europe-wide².

As big as the hypermarket segment has become, though, the story here isn’t one of universal success. Between 2019 and 2024, for example, market share of hyper-format stores dropped from 12% to 10%³. That downward trajectory looks set to continue, too; by 2029, hypermarkets are expected to account for just 9% of the total European market. Retailers across the continent will already be asking how best to buck that trend.

For the answers to that question, one good place to start is with those hypermarket operators who are defying the downturn—the ‘winners’, if you will.

dunnhumby’s Retailer Preference Index (RPI) is an ongoing international research programme. Amongst other things, the RPI helps us understand the link between ‘shopper preference’ and commercial performance; in simple terms, it tells us whether the stores that shoppers love are the same ones they spend their money with. And, in most instances, that’s very much the case.

In our 2024 RPI studies for France, Italy, and Spain, we saw something particularly interesting. When we looked at average sales growth for the ‘top⁴’ hypermarkets over the preceding three years, we found that it was 4% higher than those in the lower half. While the ‘leaders’ had grown their sales by 2%, the ‘laggards’ had seen their sales decline by the same amount.

There are plenty of familiar names in that ‘leaders’ bucket. E.Leclerc and Intermarché in France, for instance. Carrefour and Alcampo in Spain. Iper La grande i and Il Gigante in Italy. So, what can those banners tell us about how to ‘win’ in the hypermarket industry today? More importantly, what are they doing that the others aren’t?
 

Three points of differentiation

Broadly speaking, Europe’s winning hypermarkets appear to have carved out their competitive advantage in three different ways.

1. They know how to create a better all round experience for shoppers
   As well as telling us which retailers shoppers prefer, our RPI studies also tell us why. Across areas like price, in-store experience, product quality, and more, the RPI gives us deep insight into both the issues that customers care most about, and the retailers they say deliver best on them.

   Winning hypermarkets are outperforming their peers in four key areas: Loyalty & Personalisation, Price & Promotions, Convenient Locations, and Product Variety. Europe’s best score considerably higher than the competition in these categories, with shoppers pointing to discounts, low prices, and the simplicity of their loyalty programmes as some of the main points of distinction.

2. They’ve created a clear point of differentiation against supermarkets
   Hypermarkets aren’t just competing with other hypermarkets. To be successful, they need to stand out against other formats, too. Europe’s winners know this, and have taken steps to create an offering that’s differentiated from the supermarkets.

   When we look at satisfaction scores for the leading hypermarkets and supermarkets in our recent RPI studies, the former are leading in two categories: Variety and Loyalty. Customers favour the leading hypermarkets for their range of ready to eat options, the variety of their own label and organic produce, and the ease of use (and digital aspects) of their loyalty programmes.

   There are some notes of caution here too, however. Hypermarkets are seen to be considerably worse than supermarkets when it comes to the availability of staff, convenient locations, and their overall impact on their community and environment.

3. They’ve distinguished themselves from the discount retailers, too
   Just as they have with traditional supermarkets, Europe’s leading hypermarkets have learned how to stand out against the discounters as well. Understandably, there’s a lot of overlap here—the strengths around Variety and Loyalty that hypermarkets demonstrate above carry straight across.

   There is an extra dimension at play here however, and that’s Quality. While we’ve seen many discount brands investing heavily into the quality of their offering (both operationally and in terms of their produce), hypermarkets still have an edge here according to shoppers. Respondents to our RPIs noted that the quality of what they find at the shelf is significantly better at the hypermarkets than the discounters.

   Again, there’s one watchout here, and that’s prices. Hypermarkets just can’t stack up against the discounters according to respondents (which shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise).

Smart ideas, anchored in customer understanding

While the three points above may be based solely on shopper opinions, there’s plenty of real world evidence to back them up. Even a cursory glance at what some of Europe’s leading hypermarkets are doing is enough to see that the winners are winning for a reason.

There’s Iper la Grande i’s outstanding new fresh department for instance, and E.Leclerc’s clever (and very socially conscious) decision to switch its in-store signage pink in support of breast cancer awareness last October. In the UK, meanwhile, Tesco Extra shoppers can now tap into initiatives like Clubcard Plus, Tesco Whoosh, and location-based ads served up via its Scan as you Shop handsets.

Everywhere we look, Europe’s best are serving up new and different ideas. More importantly, they’re serving up new and different ideas that are intrinsically linked to what their customers want. As a format, hypermarkets are under pressure. In order to survive, they will need to maximise on their strengths when compared to other formats, as well as continuing to consider their role in customers’ lives, focusing on truly understanding the which customer needs they are addressing. And that—more than anything else—is how they’ll continue to grow.
 

1 A forgotten anniversary: the first European hypermarkets open in Brussels in 1961 - Jean-Pierre Grimmeau, 2013
2 The 20 Biggest Supermarkets in Europe in 2025 – GourmetPro, 14th January 2025
3 dh analysis of Flywheel data
4 As scored by the thousands of shoppers interviewed for our studies