10 THINGS YOU DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT THE SUPERMARKET
Say wine, snacks or haute cuisine and the gourmands at online food magazine FavorFlav know where to drink, how to eat it and what to cook. This time our cheffies serve you: 10 things you didn't know about the supermarket.
Once a week (or more often) you fill your cart, but did you know that the supermarket has only existed since World War II and that the word ‘beurtbalkje’ was invented in 1996? That grocery shopping could be such a source of cultural enrichment!
It's my turn
The name ‘beurtbalkje’ for that thing that separates your groceries from those of the people behind you was invented in 1996. At that time, the magazine Onze Taal held a competition to come up with a name for that thing. Other suggestions were: divider, checkout bar, customer bar, customer wedge, and stopper. Beurtbalkje was the winner, and in 2002, the action group Over De Balk took to the barricades to get the word included in the Van Dale dictionary. In Germany, a similar election took place, where it is called ‘Warentrenner’.
Nijmegen leads the way
The first Dutch supermarket opened in 1946. Not in a big city like Amsterdam or Rotterdam, no: in Nijmegen, Chris van Woerkom opened the doors of his supermarket. In 1948, Dirk van den Broek opened in Amsterdam, and in 1949, Kijkgrijp opened in Velsen-Noord.
Neighborhood supermarket
The average distance to the nearest supermarket is 680 meters.
King
The king of the supermarket is still Albert Heijn, they own 35 percent of the market (according to research from 2018).
Mobile supermarket
Long live the man from the SRV, the jingle for the mobile supermarket from the sixties, was sung by Het Cocktail Trio, who are also known for their songs Kangaroe Eiland and Who has seen the key to the jukebox? (and music lovers: especially google it).
Enormous
The largest supermarket chain in the world is probably the Russian Magnit, with more than 12,000 stores. In second place is the French Carrefour; always a nice outing during the holiday.
Egg hunting
To supermarket employees are most often asked where the eggs are.
Take it for a euro
A shopping cart costs about 200 euros.
Taken in
Supermarket chains want to persuade us to buy more by, among other things, placing larger carts and baskets (so that you think you are not buying much at all) and by placing the dairy section all the way at the back of the store. You usually need milk, or butter, or yogurt, and then you have to walk through the entire supermarket to get it.
Handy but expensive
Those handy meal kits that supermarkets have recently started selling are always more expensive than collecting the groceries separately, calculated Business Insider . But hey, do you feel like doing that?
Organic not cheap
Do you prefer to shop organically? The Consumers' Association calculated that you are cheapest at Dirk. The most expensive organic groceries are at the Natuurwinkel and at Odin.
