Type Private Founded 2005 Founders ICA Gruppen, Kesko | Website www.rimibaltic.com Headquarters Riga, Latvia | |
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Industry Retail, general merchandise Area served Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania Products Groceries, consumer goods Parent organizations ICA Gruppen, ICA Baltic AB Subsidiaries SIA Rimi Latvia, Kinnisvaravalduse AS, Rimi Food Eesti AS Areas served Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania Profiles | ||
Rimi Baltic is a major retail operator in the Baltic states based in Riga, Latvia. It is a subsidiary of Swedish group ICA. Rimi Baltic operates 256 (as of year 2016) retail stores in Estonia (87 stores), Latvia (117 stores) and Lithuania (52 stores) and has distribution centres in each country. The stores have different profiles, depending on range of products and size:
Contents
The interior design of the smaller Rimi hypermarkets (known as compact hypermarkets) can also be seen in ICA's smaller hypermarkets in Sweden such as ICA Maxi Västra Hamnen in Malmö and ICA Maxi Enköping.
History and ownership
Rimi Baltic was created in 2004 when Finnish Kesko and Swedish ICA agreed to merge their operations in the Baltic states in a 50/50 joint venture. Rimi Baltic officially began operations on 1 January 2005.
Kesko previously had 6 Citymarket hypermarkets and 45 Säästumarket discount foodstores in Estonia and 5 Citymarkets in Latvia and 17 Supernetto discount outlets in Latvia. ICA previously owned 33 Rimi stores (supermarkets and compact hypermarkets) across Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Following the merger all of the Citymarket stores were progressively converted to Rimi hypermarkets during 2005.
Towards the end of 2006 Kesko decided to pull out of the joint venture and sold all of its shares in Rimi Baltic to ICA. Rimi Baltic became a wholly owned subsidiary of ICA AB from 1 January 2007. Property deals relating to Kesko's ownership of the former Citymarket sites were completed a few days later.
Rimi in other countries
The Rimi name can also be found in Norway where it is used on ICA's discount food stores there. It has previously been used in Sweden by ICA and in Finland by Kesko although these stores have since been converted to other formats.