Ahold has unveiled plans to nearly double its consumer sales online, from €1.4 billion to €2.5 billion, by 2017.
The retailer made the announcement at a strategy brief- ing in Amsterdam last month.
According to Jon Wright, IGD senior business analyst, who attended the event, “Ahold’s online strategy is set to be built on the mantra of ‘More customers, More places, More choices’ in both Europe and the US.
Together, these steps, Ahold believes, will enable it to grow sales by a CAGR of between 20 and 25 per cent to 2017, by which time it will generate online consumer sales of €2.5 billion, with the majority of these made through its non-food focused brand Bol.com. The growing scale of each business will create beneficial returns by attracting new shoppers.”
With strong online brands such as AH.nl and Bol.com in the Netherlands and Peapod in the US, Wright explains, “Ahold believes that personalisation is only set to grow in importance as shoppers’ expectations of sites increases and customers assume that retailers should know them well enough to suggest the ‘right’ products to them.”
© 2014 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article written by Stephen Wynne-Jones
