Auchan

Mulliez family

Auchan SA is controlled by the Mulliez family, one of the wealthiest in France and in Europe. The Mulliez family has interests in a large number of companies:

Slogan

The slogan of the company was La Vie, La Vraie, which translates into English as "Life, the real one". The slogan was changed in 2007 to: La vie Auchan, elle change la vie – "Auchan's lifestyle changes life (itself)".

Auchan around the world

Notes:

* — stores owned by franchise partners
‡ — re-branded formerly Real hypermarkets
x — branded Alcampo in Spain

China

Auchan opened its first store in Shanghai in 1999, and according to the Auchan (China) Investment Co. Ltd. official report in 2009, there are 114 stores opened nationwide in China. Suzhou Jinji Lake store that is located in Suzhou Industrial Park had nine million population during that fiscal year with over four hundred million turnover and became one of the biggest Auchan Hypermarket in the world. Suzhou store expanded in 2008 and is the biggest Auchan Hypermarket in China, second biggest in the world. Also, Auchan China led to open its online shopping website for store in Shanghai and Suzhou. Auchan offers online shopping only in those two cities so far and is opening in Suzhou its first AuchanDrive store, based on its French model (click & go) in May 2012. The AuchanDrive service allows customers to purchase groceries online for home delivery, these locations being examples of online supermarkets in China.

United States

Auchan previously had a subsidiary, Auchan U.S.A. It was the successor of interest to Texfield Inc. which did business as Auchan Hypermarket. As of 2002 Auchan was the only French hypermarket chain to still have a U.S. presence.

Auchan's first U.S. store opened in western Houston in 1988. The 250,000-square-foot (23,000 m²) market was located on a 31.3-acre (12.7 ha) plot of land on Beltway 8, north of U.S. Route 59. The store was one of the first hypermarkets to open in the U.S. David Kaplan of the Houston Chronicle said "it was fairly unusual and became something of a tourist attraction" when it had first opened.

Auchan also opened a store in Greater Chicago in 1989. The store was a large hypermarket in the suburb of Bridgeview, Illinois. It only sold food, and it was not as large as the stores that were in Houston. In 1991 the store closed. It was later bought by a local Chicago chain, Dominick's supermarkets, and converted into an Omni Superstore by 1991.

Auchan's second Greater Houston location opened in southeast Houston in September 2000. Kaplan said "Auchan had solid business its first years, but with only two stores in the country, the company lacked buying power and economy-of-scale advantages." In January 2003 Auchan announced that both of its U.S. stores were making losses and were going to be closed; Auchan stated that it was instead going to concentrate its expansion in Asia and Europe. Auchan U.S.A. sold its first Houston location to Ho Enterprises. Lewis Food Town occupied about 110,000 square feet (10,000 m²) of the space, with the rest of the space taken by other tenants. Kaplan said that by 2003, "the Houston market is saturated with huge discounters and large grocery stores." In addition, many similar stores, including an H-E-B Food and Drug Store, the Hong Kong Supermarket, a Sam's Club, and a Wal-Mart Supercenter had opened in proximity to the west Houston Auchan. In Europe zoning laws would prevent such a high concentration of similar stores. Kaplan further added that "In Europe, shopping malls are not as prevalent as they are in America, and Auchan's everything-under-one-roof concept has greater appeal" in Europe rather than in the United States. The second former Auchan remains unoccupied, but was used as a shelter for Hurricane Katrina victims in 2005 and Hurricane Ike victims in 2008 due to its large space.

Own-label product brands

Divisions

Withdrawn ventures

Auchan opened a number of stores in Mexico; the first of these opened in Mexico City in 1997 and eventually grew to five stores. Faced with stiff competition from Wal-Mart, as well as local superstore chains Gigante and Comercial Mexicana, and French rival Carrefour (who also sold their stores and left the country in March 2005), Auchan decided to sell their stores to Comercial Mexicana and withdrew from Mexico in early 2003, most of these stores were to Soriana in 2015.

In 1997 Auchan sold its hypermarkets in Thailand to Groupe Casino.

In 2007 Auchan sold its Argentine stores to Wal-Mart and withdrew from the country.

Following a conflict with its Moroccan partner ONA, Auchan sold its 49% share in August 2007.

In January 2011 Auchan dropped out of the Dubai market after just two years.

Initial public offering

Sun Art Retail Group Ltd., the Chinese hypermarket operator backed by Auchan will go Public in Hong Kong at 15 July 2011 with hope to raise about $1 billion.

Building collapse at Savar

On 24 April 2013, the eight-story Rana Plaza commercial building collapsed in Savar, a sub-district near Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. At least 1,127 people died and over 2,438 were injured. The factory housed a number of separate garment factories employing around 5,000 people, several shops, and a bank and manufactured apparel for brands including the Benetton Group, Joe Fresh, The Children's Place, Primark, Monsoon, and DressBarn. Of the 29 brands identified as having sourced products from the Rana Plaza factories, only 9 attended meetings held in November 2013 to agree a proposal on compensation to the victims. Several companies refused to sign including Walmart, Carrefour, Bonmarché, Mango, Auchan and Kik. The agreement was signed by Primark, Loblaw, Bonmarche and El Corte Ingles.