ARCHIVED - Mercadona celebrates its success in Spain by creating 3,000 jobs
The Valencian supermarket chain expanded last year despite suffering record losses
Last year was a particularly difficult one for the retail industry in Spain, with galloping inflation drastically reducing the purchasing power of customers while pushing up production costs.
The strain has continued into 2023, as the National Institute of Statistics has confirmed that the CPI for food shot up 16.6% in February, its steepest rise since 1994.
Nevertheless, supermarket giant Mercadona is committed to fighting against this inflation without lowering the quality of products and continues to employ 99,000 workers, 3,000 of whom were hired last year.
In what he describes as a “very complicated” economy, the president of Mercadona, Juan Roig, admitted that some of the products in his stores have gone up in price, but it was either that or run out of merchandise.
“There were times when if we didn’t raise prices, there were no products,” explained Roig, who insisted that even so the company has put all its ingenuity and effort into finding alternatives, even at the cost of profitability.
Faced with these constraints, Mercadona reported an annual turnover of more than 30 billion euros last year, a big figure but still one of the lowest since the supermarket chain was established.
In terms of net profit though, the company registered 718 million euros, 5% more than in 2021.
In addition, it has maintained its policy of sharing these benefits with its workers, by increasing the amount distributed by 8%, which has increased to 405 million euros.
“We have increased salaries by 12.2% in two years,” Roig added.
Looking ahead to the rest of 2023, the supermarket giant has set its sights on lowering the price of shopping even further.
“We are going to continue working on this. We are going to lower prices without affecting quality and without affecting the sustainability of the supply chain,” said Roig, who claimed that this month, the price of 160 products had been already been reduced.
Image: Mercadona
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