Coop used to be the Nordic region’s largest company. Back then there were factories that produced vacuum cleaners, lamps and tires. But in the 90s, they would focus on grocery stores.
And while Ica has continued to gain market share, it is increasingly difficult for Coop to make a profit.
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“The Last Shot in the Gun”
– We have the last shot in the bag now. We have to reverse the downward trend and it has to happen now, says the chairman of the Cooperative Association Leif Linde to Today’s news.
This could explain why, for example, they stopped sending out the members’ magazine in the mailboxes of the Swedish customers. The money is not enough for any luxury.
Co-op – what is it?
Coop is not like other companies.
Instead of an ordinary company owned by capital-strong actors, it is the cooperative, the thousands of customers, who own Coop.
There are no rich people to lean on
Instead of the company making a profit like other companies, the money is distributed to the customers, or members.
Last year, over one billion in bonus checks were distributed to the store chain’s customers. But it also means that there is no extra money from owners to push when the company goes bad. Like now.
– During 2023, Coop had cost increases in many areas for purchasing goods, increased energy costs, inflation, a weaker Swedish krona and increased rents. It has affected the result, says Marcus Björling, press officer at Coop, to News24, and continues:
– We have not compensated increased costs in the form of increased prices, but tried to hold back. Among other things, we distributed SEK 1.8 billion to our members in 2023, i.e. our owners, in the form of member prices and member bonuses.
820 Coop stores in Sweden
The 820 food stores are run by 26 local associations, all of which get to vote on store management and annual reports.
But unfortunately, the associations go along with fallow losses and they have already sold off all the properties that the members previously owned.
700 million in loss every year
The fact that Coop is running at a loss of SEK 721 million should be compared to the fact that it ran with an almost equally large deficit the year before – SEK 698 million. In other words, the inflationary crisis for households has hit the retail chain hard.
ICA and Willys take market shares
It is possible that customers switched to cheaper alternatives when prices rose. Although Coop in northern Sweden is growing financially, it lost market share against other players such as Ica and Willys, by 7.5 percentage points.
The worst case scenario
– We haven’t grown like the market in 2023, we haven’t. Unfortunately, we have lost market share for quite a few years, says Linde.
What happens if you don’t succeed in reversing the trend, he neither wants to think about nor answer, writes the newspaper.
Bleeding money in the metropolitan regions
Coop Syd did the worst. They made an operating profit of -274 million kroner – more than every third kroner loss in the whole of Coop Sweden.
Coop Väst also had a bottom year with -199 million kroner. Stockholmsföreningen lost 163 million during the same period.
But Coop does not think that 2023 can be compared to other years.
– We knew it would be a tough year, but that it looks better for 2024. Several consumer associations have also had large provisions for pensions, which will not be the case for 2024, says Marcus Björling to Nyheter24.
A little happy news
However, it was best for the cooperatives in northern Sweden.
In Norrbotten, they made an operating profit of SEK 48 million, and in Coop Nord they made another SEK 29 million in profit.
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