Coop Denmark to sell Waitrose products

Coop Denmark, the country’s largest grocery chain retailer with 1,200 shops and over 1.3 million consumer-members, is to stock a selection of Waitrose products following an agreement between the two retailers.

Founded 150 years ago, Coop Denmark is now the top organic food retailer in the country. It will sell Waitrose’s private label products across its 83 Irma stores, mainly around Copenhagen. The supermarket will initially list 44 products from the Waitrose Cooks’ Ingredients range.

Martin Hansen, head of purchasing at Irma, said: “Waitrose is the best in England and with a history, values and quality demands which are similar to Irma. We share the pleasure of good taste and desire to try new goods. Therefore, we are looking forward to this co-operation, which hopefully will develop over the years to come.”

Coop Denmark was the nation’s first supermarket to sell organic products back in 1982. The retailer now accounts for 50% of total organic sales in Denmark and 38% of the ecologic organic market share.

The Waitrose Cooks’ Ingredients range is based on the cuisines of Pan Asia, the Middle East and South America. Irma confirmed that prices for the Waitrose products would be in line with its other products.

IGD, which provides retail analysis, says the move to offer Waitrose’s private label products should help differentiate Irma further from competitors, while allowing Waitrose to drive private label sales and build its brand abroad.

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Denmark is not the only market Waitrose is entering. The retailer has a licensing agreement with Spinneys of Dubai, which operates Waitrose branches. It also supplies products to retailers in Australia, Barbados, Bermuda, Chile, Cyprus, Dubai, the Falkland Islands, Grenada, Hong Kong, India, Kuwait, New Zealand, Philippines, Qatar, Tortola, Trinidad, Saudi Arabia and St Lucia.

More recently, Waitrose has started exporting products to China using the country’s largest e-commerce marketplace – Tmall. The retailer, which forms part of the employee-owned John Lewis Partnership, expects to grow its range of products sold in China. Waitrose products will be sold through the Royal Mail Store on Tmall run by Avenue 51. The move will enable Waitrose to access a market of 307 million buyers.