Disco is an

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, ...

supermarket chain A supermarket is a self-service Retail#Types of outlets, shop offering a wide variety of food, Drink, beverages and Household goods, household products, organized into sections. This kind of store is larger and has a wider selection than earli ...

. It is one of many supermarket chains part of the Chilean retail conglomerate

Cencosud Cencosud S.A. is a publicly traded multinational retail company. It's the largest retail company in Chile and the third largest listed retail company in Latin America, competing with the Brazilian Companhia Brasileira de Distribuição and the M ...

, after it was acquired from the

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

retailer

Ahold Koninklijke Ahold N.V. was a Dutch multinational retail company based in Zaandam, Netherlands. It merged with Belgium-based Delhaize Group in 2016 to form Ahold Delhaize. History Growth in the Netherlands The company started in 1887, when A ...

in 2004. In Argentina, Cencosud also owns the upscale hypermarket chain

Jumbo Jumbo (about December 25, 1860 – September 15, 1885), also known as Jumbo the Elephant and Jumbo the Circus Elephant, was a 19th-century male African bush elephant born in Sudan. Jumbo was exported to Jardin des Plantes, a zoo in Paris, and t ...

and the budget oriented supermarket chain Vea. , Disco had 76 stores distributed in Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Santa Fe provinces.

History

Supermercados Disco opened its first store in 1961 on Centenario Avenue in

San Isidro, Buenos Aires San Isidro is a city in Greater Buenos Aires. It is located 27.9 km from the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires (CABA). It ranks as the province's most affluent neighborhood. History In 2007, San Isidro celebrated its 300 years of existence wit ...

.Disco Argentina: Rediseño de la imagen corporatva del disco
on Eikon, 31 MAY, 2012 In 1967, a

Uruguayan Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

family bought 50% of the Argentine brand's stock, increasing their interest to 100% in 1981. The Uruguayans retained ownership of Disco until 1984. During the 1960s, Disco's first decade as a supermarket chain, it competed directly with other well known Argentine supermarkets such as Norte, Gigante, and

Tía Tiendas Industriales Asociadas S.A., branded as Tía and sometimes known as Almacenes Tía, is a South American retailing brand founded in 1940. Its divisions in Ecuador and Uruguay trade under the brands Tía, MAGDA, Ta-Ta and MULTI AHORRO, where ...

, all of which were large, national supermarket chains, and with smaller, family-owned supermarket operations across the country. In 1997, Disco bought the supermarket chain Vea for 210 million USD, getting complete ownership of the company. This purchase turned Disco into the second biggest food retailer in the country at the time, behind

Carrefour Carrefour () is a French multinational retail and wholesaling corporation headquartered in Massy, France. The eighth-largest retailer in the world by revenue, it operates a chain of hypermarkets, groceries stores and convenience stores, whic ...

. At that time, most of Disco's shares belonged to the Uruguayan Velox Holdings group. Velox also owned the Chilean chain Santa Isabel, that would later become part of Cencosud as well. Disco-Supermarket-Inside

In early 1998, Dutch food retailer

Royal Ahold Koninklijke Ahold N.V. was a Dutch multinational retail company based in Zaandam, Netherlands. It merged with Belgium-based Delhaize Group in 2016 to form Ahold Delhaize. History Growth in the Netherlands The company started in 1887, when A ...

purchased a 25% stake in Disco as well as a 18.5% stake in Santa Isabel from Velox, creating a new partnership named Disco-Ahold International. The buyout of Disco was valued at 368 million USD. Later that year, Ahold would get an increasingly bigger share of Disco until it bought the remaining 48% in an operation valued at 160 million USD, after which the company was delisted from the

NYSE The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its liste ...

to be made private. Ahold's 2003 accounting scandal ended with the resignation of the entire directory of Disco, and rumors of a possible sale of the Argentine subsidiary started to become public. Finally, in 2004, Disco was acquired by Chilean retail giant

for US$315 million, solidifying its stronghold in the Argentine retail market together with hypermarket chain Jumbo and home improvement chain Easy. In 2007, Cencosud started to convert some Disco branches to the budget-oriented Súper Vea banner in order to better be able to compete in lower income demographics. At the time, 120 locations were operating under the Disco name. As of 2018, the company operates 76 locations, mostly in Buenos Aires, Cordoba and Santa Fe provinces.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Supermercados Disco (Argentina) Retail companies established in 1961 d d Argentine companies established in 1961 Argentine subsidiaries of foreign companies