Europe’s biggest Casino
You won’t be able to bet at Europe’s number 1 Casino as it has nothing to do with betting, it is actually by footfall a French Supermarket chain called “Casino.”
The company’s full name is Casino Guichard-Perrachon and the group owns a large number of food stores. It owns over 9,300 hypermarkets (mostly Geant), supermarkets (including Casino, Franprix and Monoprix), restaurants (Casino Cafeteria), convenience stores and discount stores (Leader Price). Casino is the top convenience store operator in France and has over 2,000 outlets in countries further a field such as Argentina, Brazil, Mexico,Thailand and Vietnam.
In 1898 Geoffroy Guichard founded Societe des Magasins Casino and the first casino convenience stores were a resounding success.
The origins of Casino date back to 1860. In 1900 it became a joint-stock company in 1900 and enjoyed major growth from this point onwards.
Due to this success Casino launched the first ever own-brand products for a food store. Geoffroy Guichard also set up a family allowance system for his staff in 1920 and made sure all his products had a sell-by date in 1959 before the introduction of the law which stated all products should have a sell-by date.
The first Casino supermarket was founded in 1960 and this was followed by the Geant hypermarket in 1970. The group also opened its first outlet in the United States in 1984 and was launched in other countries in 1996.
However the French market remains Casino’s main market which in 2002 contributed to 77 percent of its sales of 23 billion euros.
This means that 23 percent of its sales in 2002 were from international business. The group has expanded in Europe with 11 hypermarkets in Poland and since 2002 has entered the Dutch market. Casino has operated in the United States from 1984 through its Smart & Final chain. The group also has a South American base with operations in Argentina, Brazil, Columbia, Mexico and Venezuela. In addition to this Casino is present in a few countries in the Far East.
Its hypermarket arm, Geant Casino was launched in 1970 in Marseille, and it quickly spread to Saint Etienne, Frejus, Montpellier, Bordeaux and Nantes. The Saint Etienne hypermarket covered 10,842 square metres and in the early 80s it had 45 departments, 2,000 parking places and staff of 470, it was also accompanied by an auto service station, a cafeteria and a gallery of shops.
By the 1980s Casino had established the restaurant chains SARL, Stefany and CafCasino.
Casino remains one of France’s top retail groups battling it out with rivals Carrefour, Leclerc and Auchan for the coveted position of France’s biggest retailer. The group also has plans to be a major global retail player with expansion in other countries.
