Discounter meets luxury department store: two Galeria department stores in Berlin have opened their doors for a Lidl store on their ground floor. However, that unusual marriage presented its own difficulties.
Specially designed
The Galeria department stores on Kurfürstendamm and Hermannplatz now accommodate Lidl supermarkets of 1,300 and 1,100 sqm respectively. The supermarkets were specially designed to suit the occasion: Lidl has decorated both stores with wooden panels, a modern look and extra focus on the fresh assortment.
Moreover, the whole store layout had to be adapted to the fact that the supermarkets have multiple entrances and exits, as they are accessible from within the department store as well as from the street. This meant that the whoe supermarket, with its normal customer journey, had to be reconsidered.
Despite the relatively limited space, the supermarkets offer a range of 4,300 products, including non-food products and a thousand plant-based products “for the Berlin customer”. Lidl thinks the new concept is ideal for “complex locations in city centres” and the discounter can thus be “part of the solution” to both space shortages and vacancies in city centres.
