Picard Surgelés is a French food company specializing in the manufacture and retail distribution of frozen products. It began as Les Glacières de Fontainebleau in 1906. Picard Surgelés has almost 900 retail stores in France. In 2014, French consumers voted Picard as their favorite brand. The company produces about 700 different products, which are sold exclusively under the Picard brand.

History

Picard began as ''Les Glacières de Fontainebleau'' in 1906. Raymond Picard founded it as an ice-supply business, to provide

household A household consists of two or more persons who live in the same dwelling. It may be of a single family or another type of person group. The household is the basic unit of analysis in many social, microeconomic and government models, and is im ...

s with blocks of

ice Ice is water frozen into a solid state, typically forming at or below temperatures of 0 degrees Celsius or Depending on the presence of impurities such as particles of soil or bubbles of air, it can appear transparent or a more or less opaq ...

prior to the advent of home

refrigerator A refrigerator, colloquially fridge, is a commercial and home appliance consisting of a thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump (mechanical, electronic or chemical) that transfers heat from its inside to its external environment so th ...

s. Arnaud Decelle bought the business in 1974 and began to sell frozen

vegetable Vegetables are parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. The original meaning is still commonly used and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including the flowers, fruits, stems, ...

s from a store in Paris. Today, Picard is owned by jointly by

Aryzta ARYZTA AG is a food business based in Zurich with operations in Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand. It is incorporated in Switzerland and is listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (the Zurich Stock Exchange). It discontinued its listing on Euron ...

(49%) and Lion Capital (51%), and commands about 20 percent of the French frozen food

market Market is a term used to describe concepts such as: *Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand *Market economy *Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market Geography *Märket, an ...

. In October 2019, Aryzta's board agreed to an offer from the Tunisian investment company Groupe Zouari to divest 43% of its stake in Picard for a sum of €156 million, with Aryzta retaining a 4.5% stake in the business. Cathy Collart Geiger replaced Philippe Pauze as Executive President in June 2020.

Retail operations

Although Picard retail stores offer some non-frozen food options, almost all of the products in each shop are frozen food. The average size of a Picard retail store is about . The variety of the food is a major selling point, which beyond frozen fruit, vegetables, meat, and fish include options such as minced

ginger Ginger (''Zingiber officinale'') is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or ginger, is widely used as a spice A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring or coloring food. Spices ...

, various chopped

herb In general use, herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables and other plants consumed for macronutrients, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal ...

s, sauteed

shallot The shallot is a botanical variety (a cultivar) of the onion. Until 2010, the (French red) shallot was classified as a separate species, ''Allium ascalonicum''. The taxon was synonymized with ''Allium cepa'' (the common onion) in 2010, as the d ...

s, peeled

chestnut The chestnuts are the deciduous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Castanea'', in the beech family Fagaceae. They are native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. The name also refers to the edible nuts they produce. The unrelat ...

s, wild

mushroom A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. ''Toadstool'' generally denotes one poisonous to humans. The standard for the name "mushroom" is t ...

pumpkin A pumpkin is a vernacular term for mature winter squash of species and varieties in the genus ''Cucurbita'' that has culinary and cultural significance but no agreed upon botanical or scientific meaning. The term ''pumpkin'' is sometimes use ...

puree, and various sauces such as

beurre blanc ''Beurre blanc'' ("white butter" in French) is a warm emulsified butter sauce made with a reduction of vinegar and/or white wine (normally Muscadet) and shallots into which softened whole butter is whisked in off the heat to prevent separation. ...

. Frozen prepared foods are also large sellers, including items like

croissants A croissant is a buttery, flaky, Austrian viennoiserie pastry inspired by the shape of the Austrian kipferl but using the French yeast-leavened laminated dough. Croissants are named for their historical crescent shape, the dough is layered wi ...

, brioches,

salad A salad is a dish consisting of mixed, mostly natural ingredients with at least one raw ingredient. They are typically served at room temperature or chilled, though some can be served warm. Condiments and salad dressings, which exist in a va ...

s, galettes,

hors d'oeuvre An hors d'oeuvre ( ; french: hors-d'œuvre ), appetiser or starter is a small dish served before a meal in European cuisine. Some hors d'oeuvres are served cold, others hot. Hors d'oeuvres may be served at the dinner table as a part of the m ...

s, entrees, and various

dessert Dessert is a course (food), course that concludes a meal. The course consists of sweet foods, such as confections, and possibly a beverage such as dessert wine and liqueur. In some parts of the world, such as much of Greece and West Africa, and ...

s. In 2016, Picard's best-selling item was extra-fine

green bean Green beans are young, unripe fruits of various cultivars of the common bean ('' Phaseolus vulgaris''), although immature or young pods of the runner bean (''Phaseolus coccineus''), yardlong bean ( ''Vigna unguiculata'' subsp. ''sesquipedalis ...

s, of which they daily sold . Shoppers use insulated bags to carry products home.

Supply chain and new products

Picard owns much of the production chain from the raw ingredients to the final products and enjoys a close relationship with farmers, and so chooses not to include many of the

additive Additive may refer to: Mathematics * Additive function, a function in number theory * Additive map, a function that preserves the addition operation * Additive set-functionn see Sigma additivity * Additive category, a preadditive category with f ...

s and

preservative A preservative is a substance or a chemical that is added to products such as food products, beverages, pharmaceutical drugs, paints, biological samples, cosmetics, wood, and many other products to prevent decomposition by microbial growth or by ...

s that other frozen food retailers include. Picard introduces around 200 new food options every year to keep consumers happy.

References

External links

picard.fr
Food and drink companies established in 1906 Food and drink companies of France Supermarkets of France French brands French companies established in 1906 Retail companies established in 1906 {{Retail-company-stub