Shareholders vote in favour of Ahold-Delhaize merger

Shareholders of supermarket chain Delhaize have voted in favour of a proposed merger with the Dutch group Ahold, which runs the Albert Heijn supermarkets. The vote in favour was 96.7% at an extraordinary shareholders’ meeting in Brussels on Monday.

The new company, to be known as Koninklijke Ahold Delhaize (Royal Ahold Delhaize) will be based in Zaandam, immediately to the north-west of Amsterdam, and will consist of more than 6,500 stores in Europe and the United States.

The new company will become the largest retailer in the Benelux, with a total of 370,000 personnel and annual turnover of €54 billion.

While Ahold shareholders at their own meeting in Amsterdam voted 99% in favour of the merger, the Brussels meeting was not without opposition. Shareholders present represented about 64 million voting shares, and some two million were abstentions. One family shareholder said he was abstaining because he did not want to be responsible for killing off the Delhaize lion. Delhaize chair Mats Janson assured him the lion was not dead but was simply “taking its career in a new direction”.

Unions took the opportunity to protest against a proposed €1.5 million bonus for Delhaize CEO Frans Muller. Outside the hall in Evere, they handed out false banknotes bearing Muller’s face. The merger means Ahold CEO Dick Boer takes over the running of the merged company, and the bonus is intended to encourage Muller to stay. The bonus was later approved by 59% of the votes present at the meeting.

Unions are also concerned about the consequences of the merger for Delhaize staff. Belgian competition authorities have already ordered the divestment of 13 Delhaize stores, and unions are said that more jobs could be lost with the move of the company’s headquarters to Zaandam.

Photo: Ahold CEO Dick Boer (left) and Delhaize CEO Frans Muller ©Eric Vidal/REUTERS