Coop Alleanza 3.0 returns to profit and for 2024 estimates sales up +2%

The accounts of Coop Alleanza 3.0, the largest consumer cooperative, return to profit. 2023 ends with sales of EUR 5.7 billion, +2.6% on the previous year, and thanks to a series of improvements in management there is a return to profit: at group level for EUR 1.3 million, which becomes net EUR 20 million for the entire perimeter of the cooperative. Values that in 2022 were in the negative area for 132.4 and 117 million respectively. The net financial position improved, falling to 1.8 billion from the previous 1.9 billion. These are the results obtained in the first year of the relaunch path announced last year with the launch of the 2023-2027 business plan for the reorganisation of the cooperative.

These are the main values presented yesterday by Milva Carletti, general manager, and Mario Cifiello, president of Coop Alleanza 3.0. "The approach to the ambitious goal of reorganising and building an increasingly solid and supportive cooperative is underway," the president remarked. We have reached a particularly significant milestone in 2023, one year earlier than expected. However, it is crucial to consider this as a starting point, not an arrival point. We must maintain a high level of attention in order to fulfil the commitment we have made to our members: to guarantee the financial and patrimonial solidity of the cooperative without ever abdicating the founding values that underpin it'. Between offers to members, conventions and advantages on spending, 165 million were distributed to members while the added value transmitted to the territory is 4.3 billion, according to Nomisma research for Coop Alleanza 3.0, with 68 thousand jobs between direct and indirect.

For this year, Coop Alleanza 3.0 is aiming for a consolidated result of 3 million, with sales growing by 2%. But 2024 got off to a rocky start, marked by a further contraction in consumption. "2024 is making us suffer, because the context is less favourable than we had imagined," reports Milva Carletti. "The recalibration of consumption upwards has not yet occurred, but we are confident that our ideas are correct.

With regard to investments, a total of EUR 120 million was allocated last year, of which EUR 95 million was spent on the sales network, to renovate 50 sales outlets, reduce the space in the Taranto hypermarket, and open the sales outlets in Rimini, Venice, Mantua, and Massenzatico, in the province of Reggio Emilia, and on innovation. With the remaining EUR 25 million, price increases were partly absorbed to offer greater convenience to customers. A doubling of this budget is planned this year. Also in 2024, three openings are planned in Bologna, Trieste and Ferrara, respectively, and two are expected in the first part of 2025 in Modena, and in the course of the year some twenty super will be renovated.

In view of the difficult economic situation, the group is focusing on own-brand products whose market share is to rise to 40 per cent in 2027 from 30.6 per cent at the end of 2023. In particular the line with 200 first-price products 'Coop spesotti' will be used tactically to counteract the offer of the discounters.