Auchan opened its 10th supermarket in Senegal on August 30th. Its programme of rapid expansion is taking on Citydia and Casino head to head in Dakar.
French supermarket Auchan has continued its programme of rapid expansion in Senegal, opening its 10th supermarket in the country. It has now opened five stores in 2017 – in January, February, March, July and this new store on August 30th. The new supermarket is situated in Cité Keur Gorgui, in Dakar. All of Auchan’s stores are in Dakar.
Having rebranded its stores from Atac to Auchan in December 2016, Auchan has ramped up its efforts to grow its store network. It currently operates two formats in Senegal: larger supermarkets of 500-750m² and smaller neighbourhood stores it operates under the myAuchan banner.
Auchan is aiming primarily at fellow European retailer Citydia, whose franchise in Senegal is operated by Société Diagonal. Citydia currently has nine standalone supermarkets in Senegal, all of which are in Dakar. However, it has also entered into an agreement with Total, the French oil retailer. As a result of this agreement, Citydia has more than 50 forecourt supermarkets in Senegal. Citydia’s forecourt supermarkets offer between 700 and 1,500 SKUs, compared to around 2,500 for a smaller neighbourhood store.
But Auchan’s expansion is also threatening Mercure’s dominance of the supermarket sector. Mercure is the franchise holder for French retailer Casino and owns 8 large supermarkets in Senegal, mostly the holdover from the old Score supermarket network. Mercure’s founder Adnan Houdrouge was born and brought up in Dakar, and he is unlikely to relish coming second best in Senegal. However, Mercure has proven slow to adapt to competition, particularly in terms of developing newer formats that push the Casino brand into more neighbourhoods and offer more convenience.
Where is Carrefour?
With Carrefour, Super U and Spar expanding across West Africa, it is highly likely that Senegal, a relatively stable economy, will continue to live up to its status as a key supermarket retail battleground. As far back as 2013 Carrefour had made it clear that it intended to open hypermarkets in Senegal with its partner CFAO. Its slow pace doing so – there are still no confirmed plans to open a store in Senegal – have left the door open for other retailers to take an easier route and open up larger numbers of smaller stores.
We have no doubt that, as has happened in Côte d’Ivoire and Kenya, if Carrefour opens up a hypermarket in a new mega mall in Senegal it will become the flagship retail destination in Dakar. But we question whether the time it is taking to do so ultimately is worth it in West Africa when there is such active interest and expansion from other European supermarket chains.
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