On October 1st 2020 the day has finally come: real.digital becomes part of the Schwarz Group and will operate the online marketplace Kaufland.de.
real.digital goes by Kaufland e-commerce today. This blogpost has been written before the change.
The Schwarz Group is an internationally leading trading company with 458.000 employees worldwide, more than 12.500 stores in 33 nations. It generated a turnover of 113,3 billion Euro in the fiscal year 2019. With its home base in Neckarsulm, Baden-Württemberg, the Schwarz Group mainly consists of the commercial divisions Lidl and Kaufland. In addition, the Schwarz Produktion and the valuably substance division GreenCycle make two further crucial mainstays of the Schwarz Group.
Both sides are profiting by the integration in the Schwarz Group: Kaufland can enter the e-commerce business with an experienced partner thanks to the already existing marketplace concept of real.digital. In return, it offers a high brand awareness with the name Kaufland and a strong market position of the Schwarz Group. Chairman of Schwarz Digital, Rolf Schumann, sees the advantages as well:
For us, the digitalization of the group is a central concern for the upcoming years. Especially for our Kaufland division with its broad product range and big presence at the market, the marketplace technology marks a crucial component for these ambitions. However, real.digital is even more than a technology component. We see a team, which has a vision and started a journey together. Next to talents and a lived passion for marketplaces, we also saw the many advantages the Schwarz Group can bring to real.digital in order to make that journey even more successful. In this win-win-situation and the shared vision of inspiring more customers and sellers as a relevant marketplace, we see the advantages of this acquisition.
On to new shores
During the next months, the real.digital team and the integration teams of the Schwarz Group and Kaufland will work together in order to enable a smooth integration. We already know that there will be a seamless transition for our customers, sellers, suppliers and employees. Also, the future holds a lot of exciting things to happen, since the marketplace business will not only grow in Germany but also on an international level.
Naturally, in the beginning of such an integration many topics are still unsolved, but one thing is already obvious: There is a lot of common ground among those teams already. The so-called belief interviews identified a lot of factors, which ensure a successful integration into the Schwarz Group, as well as similarities and differences between the companies. The managements of the Schwarz Group, Kaufland and real.digital agree to keep up the slim structures and fast processes of real.digital. As a “digital lab of the marketplace”, real.digital is supposed to position itself within the Schwarz Group with a lot of creative freedom. To keep up the startup-culture and agile work methods of the company, a maximum of independence is key. It also became clear in the interviews, that the employees of real.digital and the Schwarz Group are sharing the same performance culture and fun at work. This should also be the case in the future.
What does the Integration mean further?
Employees of the Schwarz Group benefit by a high job security and attractive career developments. Focus and goal of the integration is the growth of the marketplace. Jens Rühle, CEO of Kaufland Digital, agrees:
With real.digital as an experienced and strong team and with our market position and financial power of the Schwarz Group, we are looking forward to building a real alternative to Amazon.
We can only add: We are looking forward to this next, exciting chapter of our company story and we are ready to give our best as a part of the Schwarz Group!