Development of mass market in Morocco

Moroccan trade structure is still largely dominated by traditional business, but the supermarkets gradually gaining market share. Absent some ten years, they now represent 10% of retail. Mass market in Morocco appears as a growth area and the number of outlets increasing at a sustained pace.
The supermarket chain Label'Vie, with 18 large stores, a subsidiary of Best Financial Holding, will open three new hypermarkets in Morocco. These openings refer to the strategic plan for the period 2008-2011, which provides for the number of stores to 40. In 2007, several shareholders of the chain had defected from the hedge fund and Cyrus Capital banker Othman Benjelloun, who create the chain of supermarkets Hanouty.
Label'Vie is number two in Morocco behind the ONA which operated until 2007 with Auchan hypermarkets Marjane (17 stores) and supermarkets Acima (25 stores). In third place comes Assalam Aswak who has 7 hypermarkets, but the opening will bring the number to 15 by 2012, with an average of the opening of 2 stores per year.
Makro, a representative of the German Metro, which is focus on cash-and-carry with eight stores. The hard-discounters BIM (Turkey) and Lidl (Germany) are followers, like Carrefour, which seeks Moroccan partners.