KF ( sv, Kooperativa Förbundet, "Co-operative Union") is a

federation A federation (also known as a federal state) is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a central federal government (federalism). In a federation, the self-governin ...

consumer co-operative A consumers' co-operative is an enterprise owned by consumers and managed democratically and that aims at fulfilling the needs and aspirations of its members. Such co-operatives operate within the market system, independently of the state, as a fo ...

s in

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

and a retail group, with groceries as its core business.

History

KF was founded in 1899 by 41 local consumer co-operatives in order to support them with information and education of store managers and board members. Soon KF also became responsible for common procurement of goods. In the 1930s KF expanded rapidly during the management of Albin Johansson, setting up various industries in order to support the co-operative grocery stores. 1950-1970 KF was at the forefront of the Swedish retail trade by developing new and bigger store formats and it was one of the major business groups in Scandinavia. In the beginning of the 1990s, as a response to a financial crisis, KF decided to sell out all its industries and focus on retail trade only. Around year 2000 KF formed the retail chain

Coop Norden Coop Norden was a Scandinavian retail chain. It was based in Sweden and owned by three major cooperative retail companies: Sweden's KF (42%), Denmark's FDB (38%), and Norway's Coop NKL (20%). During its years of operation, Coop Norden ran around ...

along with its Nordic co-operative counterparts, Danish FDB and Norwegian

Coop NKL Coop Norge SA is a Norwegian cooperative. It is owned by 117 local cooperatives with approximately 2 million members. The company has its headquarters in Oslo. History The first cooperative store in Norway was opened in the 1850s and, on 27 J ...

. In 2002, KF bought a 50% share in BOL Sweden from

Bertelsmann Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA () is a German private multinational conglomerate corporation based in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, and is also active in the service sector and ...

.Bertelsmann sells BOL operations.
''New Media Age.'' 28 Nov. 2002. Due to poor financial results in Coop Norden the owners decided to renationalize the operation of the stores in 2007. In July 2021, Coop was temporarily shut down by a ransomware attack on Kaseya software services.

Today

As of 2012, KF is a federation of 39 consumer co-operatives with more than 3.2 million members and a retail group with a net worth (ex. VAT) of SEK 37.3 billion. The grocery retail group, , stands for around 85 per cent of the sale with store brands like Coop Konsum, Coop Nära, Coop Extra, Stora Coop and

Coop Forum Coop Forum is a Swedish hypermarket A hypermarket (sometimes called a hyperstore, supercentre or superstore) is a big-box store combining a supermarket and a department store. The result is an expansive retail facility carrying a wide ran ...

. KF accounts for approximately 55 percent of consumer cooperative retail sales in Sweden. The other part is run by local or regional retail cooperatives, even though procurement, logistics and store brands are integrated. Together, KF and the consumer co-operatives have a market share of 21.5 per cent of the Swedish grocery retail trade (2010).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kooperativa Forbundet Supermarkets of Sweden Companies based in Solna Municipality Cooperatives in Sweden Cooperative federations Retail companies established in 1899 1899 establishments in Sweden Food cooperatives

History

Today

See also

References