Economy 2 June 2023, 5:39pm

Aldi reports rising sales, shrinking profit for 2022, Hungarians spend a fortune at discounter

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Discount chain Aldi's revenue increased at a rate exceeding the annual average food inflation, and while its profit declined, it still reached HUF 6 billion in Hungary in 2022, according to a recent report of the company.

Aldi Hungary Food Bt.'s sales revenue rose to HUF 417.2 billion last year, up 32% from HUF 315.2 billion in 2021. The growth is six percentage points higher than last year's food inflation of 26%.

In an inflationary environment such as this one, it is most difficult to draw conclusions from revenue changes. Assuming that Aldi raised prices only by the rate of food inflation, its sales volume went up 6%. However, as discount chains are generally more competitive than Hungarian-owned chains or even the large supermarket / hypermarket chains, the volume growth could have been even greater at Aldi.

The bulk of Aldi's expenditure was accounted for by the purchase price of the products sold, HUF 301 billion, or 72% of total revenue, up 33.5% compared to 2021, meaning that the company's expenditure structure has not changed much. Services used amounted to HUF 44.6 billion, up 29.2% compared to 2021. Of this, various rental fees, IT and transport and advertising costs accounted for the largest share.

Wage bill up 27%

HUF 32.4 billion was spent on wages, 27% more than in 2021, but there was a big difference in this respect between the wage growth of manual and white-collar staff.

The wage bill for manual workers rose by 30%, compared with 16% for white-collar workers. Although the report does not give a headcount, Aldi previously reported 6,000 employees at the end of 2022.

After paying HUF 244 million in taxes, Aldi Hungary made a profit of HUF 6 billion, HUF 2.5 billion less than in 2021. The owners will put this in the profit and loss reserve. The company's equity has increased to HUF 50 billion.