Lidl Portugal to invest €100 million

Budget supermarket chain Lidl is to invest €100 million by March 2019 in Portugal.

The German multinational’s investment represents a 40% increase on 2017 and double the investment on 2016.

The lion’s share of the investment will be on building a new warehouse depot at Santo Tirso which will replace the current distribution depot at Famalicão and will cost €70 million.

At the same time, investment will also centre on expanding a second depot at Torres Novas from 30,000m2 to 40,000m2, works costing €20 million.

In addition to these “significant investments” on distribution centres, Lidl Portugal is to open new stores in the Greater Lisbon, Porto and Algarve regions.

In 2017 Lidl achieved an 8.6% market share, the same year in which it invested €70 million in Portugal and €50 million in 2016.

“This tax year, which began in March, we’ll invest €100 million,” said Lidl’s Massimiliano Silvestri at a meeting with journalists at Lidl’s headquarters in Portugal at Linhó, Sintra.

“Work on the expansion plan for the Torres Vedras depot will begin at the end of the summer with the aim of modernising the distribution centre and expanding it by 10,000m2,” said the country director.

Work on the new distribution depot at Santo Tirso, which will be modern and state-of-the-art, will start later this year and take three years to complete (2020).

Regarding 2017, the country manager said growth had been “positive” with Lidl Portugal registering two-digit growth without revealing exact figures.

Last year, Lidl exported €100 million worth of Portuguese products, an increase of 40% on 2016.

“We want to invest in this country”, said the director adding that “100% of the meat sold at its chain of supermarkets nationwide was Portuguese while 70% of fruit and vegetables were national produce.”