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 one 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 that is frozen into a solid state, typically forming at or below temperatures of 0 ° C, 32 ° F, or 273.15 K. It occurs naturally on Earth, on other planets, in Oort cloud objects, and as interstellar ice. As a naturally oc ...

prior to the advent of home

refrigerator A refrigerator, commonly shortened to fridge, is a commercial and home appliance consisting of a thermal insulation, thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump (mechanical, electronic or chemical) that transfers heat from its inside to ...

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

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

s from a store in Paris. Today, Picard is owned jointly by Aryzta (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 *Marketing, the act of sat ...

. 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. In October 2024, Groupe Zouari announced a purchase of Lion Capital's ownership in Picard. The sale will be finalized by the end of Q1 2025 and will make Groupe Zouari the sole owner of Picard.

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 and a folk medicine. It is an herbaceous perennial that grows annual pseudostems (false stems made of the rolled bases of l ...

, various chopped

herb Herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal purposes, or for fragrances. Culinary use typically distingu ...

s, sauteed

shallot The shallot is a cultivar group 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 difference was t ...

s, peeled

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

s, wild

mushroom A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing Sporocarp (fungi), fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground on soil or another food source. ''Toadstool'' generally refers to a poisonous mushroom. The standard for the n ...

pumpkin A pumpkin is a cultivar, cultivated winter squash in the genus ''Cucurbita''. The term is most commonly applied to round, orange-colored squash varieties, but does not possess a scientific definition. It may be used in reference to many dif ...

puree, and various sauces such as

beurre blanc ''Beurre blanc'' (; ) or ''Beurre Nantais'' () 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 separat ...

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

brioche Brioche (, also , , ) is a bread of French origin whose high egg and butter content gives it a rich and tender crumb. Chef Joël Robuchon described it as "light and slightly puffy, more or less fine, according to the proportion of butter and e ...

salad A salad is a dish consisting of mixed ingredients, frequently vegetables. They are typically served chilled or at room temperature, though some can be served warm. Condiments called '' salad dressings'', which exist in a variety of flavors, a ...

s, galettes,

hors d'oeuvre An hors d'oeuvre ( ; ), appetiser, appetizer 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 meal, or ...

s, entrees, and various

dessert Dessert is a course (food), course that concludes a meal; the course consists of sweet foods, such as cake, biscuit, ice cream, and possibly a beverage, such as dessert wine or liqueur. Some cultures sweeten foods that are more commonly umami, ...

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. ''sesquipedali ...

s, of which they daily sold . Shoppers use insulated bags to carry products home. Picard entered the Japan market in 2014 through a partnership with

Aeon The word aeon , also spelled eon (in American and Australian English), originally meant "life", "vital force" or "being", "generation" or "a period of time", though it tended to be translated as "age" in the sense of "ages", "forever", "timele ...

, initially by selling Picard products in Aeon supermarkets. The first dedicated Picard retail store in Japan opened in October 2016. In Japan, the brand is positioned as an upmarket food retailer, with stores in the most prestigious neighborhoods of Tokyo and prices on average 40% higher than in France.

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-function see Sigma additivity * Additive category, a preadditive category with fin ...

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 ...

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
{{DEFAULTSORT:Picard Surgeles 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