The general manager of Aldi in France, Philip Demeulemeester, was replaced on February 1 by Pascal Hirth, who has worked for the company for fifteen years, Aldi told AFP on Friday, confirming information from several media.
Philip Demeulemeester, who had been in office since 2015, left his post citing "
personal reasons
", according to the company's communication, which confirms information from sector specialist Olivier Dauvers and the media specializing in LSA distribution.
"
Pascal Hirth, who has worked for Aldi for 15 years - and for several months as vice-CEO (general manager) in France - was effectively appointed CEO of Aldi France on February 1, 2023
", further specifies the corporate communications.
500 Leader Price stores
Philip Demeulemeester notably integrated more than 500 Leader Price stores, acquired in 2020 by Aldi from the group that owns the "
hard discount
" brand, Casino.
This is a large number of stores on the scale of the German group, which arrived in France in 1988 and which today claims more than 1,300 stores there, without communicating on the extent of sales made in France.
In terms of market share, Aldi is at the end of 2022 in France the 8th player in food distribution, with 2.3% of the market, behind in order E.Leclerc, Carrefour, Intermarché, Système U, Auchan, Lidl and the brands of the Casino group (including Monoprix and Franprix), according to the panelist Kantar, who is a reference in the matter.
Read also“I am not poor, and I go there”: in Paris, Aldi and Lidl are increasingly attracting the wealthy classes
On an international scale, Aldi is one of the distribution giants, ranked 8th in the world by the firm Deloitte, which produces an annual estimate of the weight of distributors in the world.
This ranking is dominated by three Americans, Walmart, Amazon and Costco, and the Schwarz group, which includes the Lidl brand, is 4th.
