Report: Wal-Mart Continues to Dominate Top Retaile
Columbus, OH, October 21, 2005--Retail Forward in its annual release of The Top 200 Retailers Worldwide reports that Wal-Mart's growing international presence is cementing the company's position at the top of the list of the world's largest retailers, a place the company has held since 1990.
However, Wal-Mart's international outlook will hinge on whether the company can extend its success beyond Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom. In its companion Wal-Mart Global Outlook report, Retail Forward assesses several initiatives that will drive Wal-Mart's global expansion and identifies opportunities for competitors to survive and thrive in a Wal-Mart world.
The Top 200 Retailers Worldwide
The changes in the Top 200 Retailers Worldwide list in 2004 were driven by strength among regional retailers and homegoods retailers and by weakness among those companies operating in the softgoods sector. The broad picture, however, remained the same: The list continues to be dominated by Wal-Mart; food, drug, mass (FDM) retailers; and U.S.-based retailers.
The Top 200 Retailers Worldwide was developed using company annual reports and other public sources of information. Results are based on retail operations only unless non-retail operations were not broken out separately.
"The number of truly global retailers will increase as fast growth in developing markets beckons amid slow growth in mature, developed markets," comments Frank Badillo, Retail Forward senior economist and manager of the Global Retailing Program of the Retail Forward Intelligence System. "Globalization, however, will likely occur at a modest pace, held back by myriad obstacles," he adds. Retail Forward projects that mergers and acquisitions will accelerate as a way to overcome some of these obstacles and the shakeout among the leading global retailers will likely include some well-known companies that will prove unable to respond to the shifting growth prospects.
Highlights from this year's report include:
U.S. Retail Surge Fostered Strong Growth. Wal-Mart and other U.S.-based retailers continued to dominate the list of top retailers worldwide in 2004. These leading U.S. retailers benefited from the surge last year in retail spending, which also helped insulate them from the impact of a weak dollar. Conversely, strong domestic currencies contributed to higher rankings for Tesco in the United Kingdom and ITM Entreprises in France. Both in the United States and abroad, mergers and acquisitions also generated large sales gains as regulatory restrictions stifled organic growth in many sectors.
Softgoods Struggled While Homegoods Led the Way. Sales weakened by apparel deflation, the softgoods sector also posted much slower growth than the food, drug, mass sector and homegoods retailers which benefited from strong housing markets around the world.
Retail Forward Top 10 Retailers Worldwide 2004
Rank Company Home Country Net Sales (Millions USD)
1 Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. United States $285,222
2 Carrefour Group France $101,235
3 The Home Depot, Inc. United States $73,094
4 Metro AG Germany $70,162
5 Tesco PLC United Kingdom $62,274
6 Ito-Yokado Co., Ltd Japan $56,812
7 The Kroger Co. United States $56,434
8 ITM Entreprises SA France $47,264
9 Costco Companies, Inc. United States $47,146
10 Royal Ahold Netherlands $45,864
