Carrefour has opened an organic produce store designed to make eco-friendly products more accessible. John Ryan pays a visit.

Carrefour Bio, Paris

Address 29 Boulevard Diderot, Paris

Size 1,830 sq ft

Opened March 2013

Number of organic products 2,000-plus

Ambience Sustainable

Organic food is frequently perceived as a fad for the well-heeled middle classes, who think that by eating food that is free from additives, chemicals and suchlike, they may live longer and be healthier. Whether this is the case is open to question, but ‘organic’ stores continue to be a phenomenon largely confined to the UK’s larger metropolitan areas.

There is a sense that if only these outlets were a mite less expensive, then more people might shop at them - everyone would like to live longer and in a healthier manner, after all.

Head over to Germany and organic supermarkets are on almost every corner and sensitivity to a product’s provenance is to the fore in a way that it isn’t in the UK, largely due to the temptation of low price. Germany is something of an exception, though, and most countries demonstrate traits similar to the UK.

Things may be changing. Take the Eurostar to Paris and on the Boulevard Diderot, close to the Gare de Lyon, Carrefour has opened its first dedicated organic store. It is actually quite easy to miss - it may be on a major street, but it is almost corner shop-like in both size and external execution.

The logo takes Carrefour’s familiar ‘C’ and adds the word ‘Bio’ to it. It is a measure of how strong this brand is in France that the retailer feels no obligation to include the name Carrefour as part of the store’s exterior identity.

Beneath the logo the window has been blanked out with whiteboards on which a faux-handwritten sign informs shoppers that the store is open from 8am to 10pm every day.

This puts it into convenience store territory - and the fact that you can’t actually see into the store perhaps reinforces this impression.

The word ‘Bio’ does, however, take the onlooker more into natural/organic retailing territory and so is less of a problem than might at first be imagined.

Unambiguously organic

Stand on the threshold of the store and any notion of convenience is dispelled. The sense that this is a retailer of organic products is also apparent. The initial vista is of fresh fruit and vegetables - much like in any other small supermarket - but the game is given away by the galvanised metal pails that have been used as pendant lightshades above the products.

It’s a basic piece of scene-setting, but the consequence is that there is no misunderstanding what this store is about.

Glance down, and at the front of the fruit and veg bin there is a graphic, once more in the faux-hand-drawn style, that declares ‘C’est La Saison!’ (it’s the season!).

On the day of visiting, there were watermelons next to it and a supplementary sign informed shoppers that this product came from Spain. In keeping with the environmental lobby’s concern with ‘food miles’, there are signs above each
type of fruit and vegetable stating their country of origin. It would appear that long-haul air travel is not part of the sourcing policy for the fresh products in Carrefour Bio. The fact that seasonality is also part of the story told by the graphics gives the visitor more information about the store’s bio-organic intent.

Going primitive

High-tech plays little part in the ambience of this store. Instead, the approach adopted is back-to-basics, with the suspended metal scales next to the fruit and veg harking back to an earlier and less complex era in supermarket retailing. This is, of course, something of an illusion. Carrefour is nothing if not canny when it comes to using the technology that it already has at its disposal in its more mainstream stores.

To the right are chiller units, internally lit with LEDs, and with clear glass doors that allow shoppers to look at the product. The low(er) energy requirements of these fridges are in fact becoming standard in many new supermarkets, but they fit perfectly with the demands of a Bio store.

Elsewhere in the shop, there is a large quantity of ambient merchandise, which does make the business of holding perishable stock less of a problem and means that costs to the shopper can more easily be contained. And as is relatively commonplace in large French hypermarkets dried pulses, grains and cereals are available in the quantity the shopper needs, in jars with hoppers, rather than heavily pre-packaged items.

It is the graphics package that really hammers home the organic message. Signs that translate as ‘At last, Bio products for all and for all budgets’, and another that reads ‘More than 20 years’ experience with Bio products’ show that Carrefour is at pains to ensure this is a store that will have a more popular appeal than other conventional organic outlets.

A taste of more to come

Carrefour Bio adopts an almost ‘organic by numbers’ aesthetic, with extensive use made at the checkout and around the perimeter of wood, striking a suitably environmentally sustainable note. The white ceilings contrast well with the black walls and pillars, which in turn do not distract from the product packaging.

Finally, mention should be made of the brown paper bags that older readers may have been used to when they visited greengrocers in bygone days.

This is a bold attempt by France’s leading supermarket group to create a format that will demystify organic produce for the average consumer and make it affordable and more accessible. There is clearly a question mark over whether it will be adopted by Parisian shoppers, but if it is, at least it is ready for roll-out, owing to the modular nature of the store’s fit-out.

The area around Gare de Lyon may not be Paris’ ritziest district, but for the moment at least it is in the vanguard of France’s eco-friendly organic movement. -