Product affordability

The year 2024 was characterized by a challenging global and economic context, driven by geopolitical tensions, the social effects of extraordinary price inflation experienced in recent years and the current food deflation, rising costs in production, and increasing competitive dynamics¹. As a result, we have maintained our strategy on providing accessible products to consumers, in order to democratise the access to safe and high-quality food, always aiming to have the best prices in the countries where we operate. The Group’s Companies have the purpose of guaranteeing their customers’ preference, always focussed on offering the lowest prices without compromising quality in each market.

To ensure the robustness of our offer, and ultimately to prevent and mitigate the impact on consumers purchasing power and accessibility to quality products, we have implemented a series of measures across all our banners. A detailed explanation of each Company’s strategy is available in “Performance of the business areas”.

Some of the most relevant actions are presented by Company below.

Research

• Market and customer research studies, focusing on the social and economic state of our geographies, customer satisfaction, competitors’ tactics, as well as sales analyses, give us valuable insights to continuously place our brands as simultaneously price-attractive and affordable, and of high quality and safe.

Supplier engagement and category management

• Supplier management procedures, that aim at ensuring differentiation of our products and services through price, quality and safety standards in place.
• Category management procedures, that focus on continuous improvement of our product portfolio.

Marketing initiatives

• “Nobody cares about their customers’ wallets as much as Biedronka” campaign, which reduced the prices of more than 400 products.
• Maintenance of more than 4,000 regular prices, despite the return of VAT on basic food products in April.
• Service counters for butchers and delicatessens in more than 1,300 stores.
• Moja Biedronka app reached 13 million users.
• 60 promotional campaigns throughout the year.

• The ‘My Pingo Doce’ app was an important savings tool, offering exclusive and personalised advantages to its users through initiatives such as “Poupa Shaker” (Save Shaker), “Clube do Bebé” (Baby Club), and “Clube do Vinho” (Wine Club), and other loyalty and savings initiatives with partners across various sectors, such as fuel, educational supplies, and travel.
• Opening of 40 more Comida Fresca restaurants, for a total of 237, offering a very varied and complete range of ready meals for all families at affordable prices.
• Pingo Doce’s loyalty contests that raised awareness and leverage the economic context, offering daily prizes worth over €1,500.
• 54 promotional campaigns throughout the year.

• Weekly promotions and low prices every day.
• Daily discount marathons “Super Hits”.
• Launch of the “Aguinaldo” scratch cards, with offers of vouchers to spend on products in Ara shops campaign.
• “En Ara SÍ te alcanza para TODO” as the claim of a campaign offering extra savings opportunities on various products, and reinforcing the overall perception of price.
• 30 promotional campaigns throughout the year.

• 54 promotional campaigns throughout the year.

 

• 86 major promotions during the year,
• Up to 150 top selling products at constantly low prices during the year,
• Third edition of the Hebe Quiz, an activity dedicated to our customers with over 17,000 prizes available through the mobile app. The campaign reached around 1.08 million users visiting the Quiz landing page in the mobile app.
• 2nd edition of the Hebe Mobile App Days in Slovakia and the Czech Republic offering customers the opportunity, under minimum purchases conditions, to purchase a product for 1 Kc or for 1 cent.

We evaluate the effectiveness of our actions through internal studies that benchmark our prices and assortment against those of our competitors and through our regular management meetings that include all relevant areas of expertise to reach our business goals whilst providing our high-quality products at affordable prices. Additionally, we indirectly measure the affordability of our value proposition by analysing sales performance.

The Group’s main targets to foster affordability while sustaining our long-term vision to democratize the access to quality and safe products to consumers, are intrinsically connected to our value-creation business strategy and accompany our daily activities:

• Continue to follow a scale-economy strategy in order to create value for both the business and consumers.
• Ensure product quality, safety and great taste at the best price.
• Making impactful customer sales experience and a sense of belonging with consumers.
• Ensure advertising reaches our consumers and is relevant for their priorities and expectations.
• Acquire new customers, retain existing ones and recover lost clients.
• Continuously improve our products and services, aiming at maintaining/gaining market leadership.

¹ For more detailed information regarding the global context and its impact on the Companies, and the specific actions taken to safeguard the brands with fair and accessible prices, please refer to “2024 Context”.