The supermarket landscape in Mexico is shaped by four major companies: Walmart de México, Organización Soriana, Grupo Commercial Chedraui, and Grupo La Comer. Accounting for the various needs and shopping habits of the population, these corporations are present in different formats, with discount, premium, and regular supermarkets available for consumers.
Walmart de México
In 2018, Walmart de México was the leading supermarket company, with a sales market share of 68 percent, and a net income amounting to nearly 37 billion Mexican pesos. According to a 2018 survey, of the company’s 2,442 stores, those known as Bodega Aurrera, a discount format of the supermarket group, were the most popular supermarkets in the country.
Organización Soriana
Walmart’s market share was followed by that of Organización Soriana, a Mexican group that accounted for 17 percent of sales in the industry. In 2018, the company generated a net income of nearly four billion Mexican pesos and provided employment to more than 97 thousand people. In that year, Organización Soriana’s most common brand was “Soriana Hiper” - the format with the largest retail space, operating a network of 295 stores.
Grupo Commercial Chedraui
As the third largest enterprise in the industry, Grupo Commercial Chedraui accounted for 13 percent of the 2018 sales market value. Besides Mexico, the Mexican group also operates stores in the United States under the brand name “El Super”. With more than 52 thousand employees and a net income of approximately two billion Mexican pesos, the company generated over 60 percent of its revenue from its Mexican division. In Mexico, “Tiendas Chedraui” and “Super Chedraui” were the two most common formats, with stores present in cities with more than 100,000 and 25,000 inhabitants respectively.
La Comer
With two percent of the sales market share in 2018, Grupo La Comer operated 65 stores in Mexico in four different formats. La Comer is its most common brand, and differs from other chains by not operating in the apparel and footwear segments. Another of the group’s formats is City Market, a supermarket focused on premium products and targeted to groups with a relatively high purchasing power.
Consumer behavior
Whether Mexican customers shop in Walmart, Soriana, Chedraui, or La Comer, they share certain characteristics and shopping habits. According to a survey carried out in 2018, the average Mexican buyer has a shopping frequency of one large purchase per week, enjoys grocery shopping, and focuses mainly on prices and discounts when comparing store attributes. It does not come as a surprise that affordability greatly influences grocery consumption, as 35 percent of Mexican households’ expenditure is devoted to food, beverages and tobacco. In fact, average household expenditure in supermarkets in Mexico amounted to nearly 150 U.S. dollars every month in 2018, approximately half the spending incurred by Chilean households.
