New joint venture reinvigorates the Raiffeisen scene

A shake-up is taking place in the segment covering Raiffeisen cooperative stores and small DIY stores in Austria and above all in Germany. The ZG Raiffeisen Group of Karlsruhe, which is active in southwest Germany, and the Austrian company RWA Raiffeisen Ware Austria AG, Vienna, are establishing a joint purchasing venture. The mission of the new Karlsruhe-based HGD Haus und Garten Deutschland Handelskooperation GmbH will be to pool purchasing in the house and garden market sector. HGD will also position itself as a partner for small home and garden stores in Germany, offering them a special portfolio of services such as marketing and sales support. Potential is believed to exist in particular with regard to small-scale businesses with a retail area of up to 2 000 m².
Via its subsidiary AFS Franchise-Systeme, RWA is the central organisation for 520 home and garden stores operating under the Lagerhaus brand in Austria. ZG Raiffeisen operates around 100 branches offering a comparable range in Germany.
By combining purchasing volumes in the future it is hoped to obtain improved terms for the roughly 1 000 stores as a whole. The overall purchasing volume of RWA and ZG Raiffeisen currently amounts to roughly half a billion euros.