Rimi Baltic

Rimi Baltic is a major retail operator in the Baltic states based in Riga, Latvia. Rimi Baltic operates 220 retail stores in Estonia (66 stores), Latvia (96 stores) and Lithuania (58 stores) and has distribution centres in each country. The stores have different profiles, depending on range of products and size:
* Rimi Hypermarket - hypermarkets
* Rimi - supermarkets
* Säästumarket (in Estonia), Supernetto (in Latvia and Lithuania) - no frills supermarkets

The interior design of the smaller Rimi hypermarkets (known as compact hypermarkets) can also be seen in ICA's smaller hypermarkets in Sweden such as ICA Maxi Västra Hamnen in Malmö and ICA Maxi Enköping.

History and Ownership

Rimi Baltic was created in 2004 when Finnish Kesko and Swedish ICA agreed to merge their operations in the Baltic states in a 50/50 joint venture. Rimi Baltic officially began operations on 1 January 2005.

Kesko previously had 6 Citymarket hypermarkets and 45 Säästumarket discount foodstores in Estonia and 5 Citymarkets in Latvia and 17 Super Netto discount outlets in Latvia. ICA previously owned 33 Rimi stores (supermarkets and compact hypermarkets) across Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Following the merger all of the Citymarket stores were progressively converted to Rimi hypermarkets during 2005.

Towards the end of 2006 Kesko decided to pull out of the joint venture and sold all of its shares in Rimi Baltic to ICA. Rimi Baltic became a wholly owned subsidiary of ICA AB from 1 January 2007. Property deals relating to Kesko's ownership of the former Citymarket sites were completed a few days later.

Rimi in other countries

The Rimi name (although with a different logo) can also be found in Norway where it is used on ICA's discount food stores there. It has previously been used in Sweden by ICA and in Finland by Kesko although these stores have since been converted to other formats.

External links

* [http://www.rimibaltic.com/ Official website]
* [http://www.kesko.fi/modules/release/show_release.asp?id=9309372FF65048AF9BA121C1AE4A718C&kieli=eng&laytmp=kesko2005_eng Press Release on merger of ICA and Kesko's operations in the Baltic states]
* [http://www.ica.se/FrontServlet?s=in_english&state=press_visa&pagelink=http://www.pirab.se/FTP/Kund9779/ICAWebb/EN-2006-10-10-07-18/ICA.html&doc=null&pdf=null ICA's acquisition of Kesko's stake in the venture]