Was the joy short-lived? The Les Mousquetaires group, owner of the Intermarché brand, declared this Wednesday that it was forced to resell three of the 61 stores purchased from Casino in October. These operations were provided for in an agreement reached in May which allowed the latter to reduce its debt and the former to increase its market share, during two waves of successive sales of Casino stores.
One of the two Breton stores sold
Now, according to what the group declared, “the Competition Authority has expressed very serious doubts about the competition in the catchment area” of three stores: the Plouaret supermarket, in Côtes-d’Armor – one of the two to have been sold in Brittany to Intermarché in October with that of La Gacilly in Morbihan – but also the hypermarkets of Vals-près-le-Puy (Haute-Loire) and Lons-le-Saunier ( Jura).
A decision in January?
If the Competition Authority indicated to AFP that it could not comment on this “file still under investigation within [son] concentration service” and “for which a decision could be made in January”, the Intermarché group, while awaiting “written notification of this decision”, already says it regrets it “for the members concerned and their employees”. “We will comply with this decision,” he added.
” Intolerable “
“Humanly, it’s unbearable for the employees,” Christophe Romeuf, CGT union representative at the Vals-près-le-Puy hypermarket, reacted to AFP. “The oldest will therefore work there under a 4th brand, after Rallye, Casino, and Intermarché,” he added. In this hypermarket, “the 110 employees feel worried, even if there is a 99% chance that we will be bought (…) by Carrefour or Leclerc, because Auchan and Système U are already established in the Puy basin”, underlined Stéphane Barriol, FO delegate.