Obituary: Albert Heijn, the grocer with 8P Insight

Albert Heijn, who died last week aged 83, played a key role in turning his family’s Dutch grocery chain into the international food retailing group Royal Ahold,

His motto was: “You don’t sell on behalf of your suppliers – you buy on behalf of your customers".

Heijn was among the first supermarket bosses to introduce sell-by dates, organic and other “private label” products as well as bonus or club cards and the machine-readable barcode system at check-outs. In the early 1970s, he was a driving force behind the international barcode standard used in most countries today.

However, while others shared his focus on meeting shopper needs, AH provided a tool to make it possible…

Twenty five years ago he introduced a retail version of the 4Ps of consumer marketing.

His simple 8Ps of Retail marketing provided a tool for many KAMs to gain insight into how retailers market their shops, and a way for shoppers to evaluate alternative retail offerings....

A truly great loss to grocery retailing everywhere...