How European retail chains buy

European retail chains add new products at fixed points in the year, not when a supplier writes. Each category is reviewed on a planned cycle, and the decision about what goes on the shelf is taken weeks before the shelf changes. A supplier who arrives after the window has closed waits for the next one, however good the product.

That is why timing decides more than the pitch. The strongest presentation in March does nothing for a category that was reviewed in February and will not open again until September.

Suppose a maker of packaged snacks from outside the EU sends samples to a Scandinavian grocery chain in early May and expects a decision by the summer. The chain’s calendar was set the previous autumn. The category may already have been reviewed, and the next review asks for product data months before anything reaches a store. The samples were fine. The calendar was never read.

What a range review is

The range review, also called a category review or an assortment revision, is the point at which a retailer decides which products stay in a category, which leave, and which new ones come in. Between reviews the shelf is largely closed. During a review, suppliers present, the category buyer decides, and the shelf plan is rebuilt.

The Swedish grocery group ICA publishes this process to its suppliers in unusual detail, which makes it a useful model of how a European chain thinks. At ICA, the category manager in each area decides which central assortment is offered to the stores. For 2026, ICA introduced its own calendar of assortment revisions. It replaces the industry-wide process coordinated through ECR, which ended at the turn of 2025 to 2026. The new calendar has twelve revision windows, against nine under the shared process, and categories with a high rate of new products are revised more often than slower ones.

Other chains publish less. The logic travels anyway: a buyer reviews a category when the calendar says so, and the supplier who knows that date is already prepared when it comes.

How far ahead the calendar runs

ICA’s supplier manual sets out each revision as a sixteen-week sequence:

1. Week 1: the supplier notifies the chain and submits article information.
2. Weeks 3 and 4: the supplier presents to the category manager.
3. Weeks 5 to 8: the chain gives its listing decision.
4. Weeks 9 to 15: a detailed listing decision in weeks 9 to 11, then preparation for the launch or the phase-out.
5. Week 16: the change starts on the shelf.

Read backwards, the work starts about four months before the shelf changes. For the revision dated 19 January 2026, the first supplier deadline fell on 26 September 2025. For the April window, it fell on 12 December. Dairy appears in two windows in ICA’s 2026 grid, 9 February and 7 September, so a dairy supplier who misses one waits about five to seven months for the next.

The practical rule is simple. For every target chain and every category, a supplier should know when the next review opens and what data the chain asks for in its first week.

Why France negotiates early in the year

France writes the commercial calendar into law. The annual agreements that the French Code de commerce requires between suppliers and distributors have long had to be signed by 1 March. Loi n° 2026-796 of 18 August 2026 brings that forward for smaller suppliers. For suppliers with a worldwide annual turnover below 350 million euros excluding VAT, the deadline moves to 31 January, and their general terms of sale must reach the buyer by 30 November. The change is an experiment covering agreements concluded between 1 January 2027 and 31 December 2029. Above the threshold, 1 March still applies, and the new rule does not apply to wholesalers.

The practical effect is that the French buying season now runs from late autumn into the first weeks of the year. A supplier approaching a French chain in January arrives in the busiest weeks, when buyers are closing terms with the suppliers they already have. An approach in spring or early autumn meets a buyer with more room to listen, and leaves time to be ready for the next round.

Buying groups that cross borders

Many European chains do not negotiate alone. Retail alliances pool purchasing across chains, and increasingly across countries. A 2020 report by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre describes European alliances that typically do not buy jointly, but that run joint tenders for private label products and negotiate so-called on-top agreements with large brand suppliers, covering services such as promotion, growth plans or internationalisation. AgeCore and Coopernic are examples. Eurelec, formed by REWE and E. Leclerc in 2016, goes further: the report describes it as a buying joint venture that negotiates and purchases goods from a selected list of large brand manufacturers, and at the time the only European alliance buying jointly.

How concentrated retail is varies widely between countries. The same report cites a five-firm concentration ratio for retailing in 2016 that ranged from 35 percent in Greece to 90 percent in Finland. Where five groups hold nine tenths of the market, a supplier has few doors and each one matters. Where retail is fragmented, there are more doors and each one is smaller.

For a manufacturer the useful question is narrower. Does this chain decide on your category nationally, or through a group based in another country? The person who decides may not sit in the market you are selling into.

Do chains charge listing fees?

In food, European law answers part of this question. Directive (EU) 2019/633 on unfair trading practices in the agricultural and food supply chain protects suppliers with a turnover of up to 350 million euros. It sorts practices into two lists.

The first list is banned outright. It includes paying later than 30 days for perishable agricultural and food products, paying later than 60 days for other agri-food products, cancelling orders of perishable products at short notice, and changing the contract unilaterally.

The second list is allowed only if it was agreed beforehand. It includes returns of unsold products and payments by the supplier for stocking, display, listing, promotion and marketing. So a listing payment is not illegal in itself. What the Directive prohibits is imposing one without prior agreement. All 27 member states had transposed the Directive by December 2022.

Outside agri-food, Directive 2011/7/EU on late payment sets the default. Businesses must pay invoices within 60 days unless they expressly agree otherwise, provided the longer term is not grossly unfair to the creditor. Public authorities must pay within 30 days, or 60 days in very exceptional circumstances. A supplier planning cash flow should model the payment terms it will actually be offered, not the date on the invoice.

When should a supplier approach?

Put the calendar together and the first approach belongs well before the review, not in the middle of it. A workable sequence, read backwards from the shelf:

1. Find the review window for your category at each target chain, and the date the article data is due.
2. Reach the category buyer before that date, early enough for the buyer to ask questions and request samples.
3. Have the listing data ready before the window opens: product identifiers, pack and pallet dimensions, the proposed shelf price, and the lead time from stock inside the EU.
4. Present inside the window, with the answers the buyer will ask for in the first meeting.

The pitch still matters. A clear pitch in the right week gets reviewed. A strong pitch in the wrong week gets filed.

What the buyer asks on day one

In a review, a buyer compares products on data rather than on enthusiasm. Expect questions about product identifiers and barcodes, pack and pallet dimensions, the recommended shelf price and the margin it leaves the chain, the lead time from order to the chain’s depot, and who handles recalls and returns.

A supplier from outside the EU should expect two more. Where does the stock sit, and who is named on the import? A buyer who hears “it ships from overseas when you order” hears a longer lead time and an unanswered customs question. A buyer who hears that stock is already inside the EU, released for free circulation, hears a supplier that can deliver like a local one. Distributors ask a similar list, set out in what European distributors ask before signing.

How this runs at EFC

EFC helps companies from outside the EU operate and grow in Europe and around the world. In its business development work, the buying calendar is part of the market map: for each target chain, how it buys, who decides on the category, and when the next review opens. Approaches go out when a buyer can act on them, in material the client has approved, and the client signs its own contracts.

The stock question has its answer ready when the goods already sit in Portugal, inside the EU customs union, and reach the depot through EFC’s fulfilment. That side is quoted separately.

What this article is not

This article describes how buying calendars, and the rules that sit around them, generally work. It is not legal advice. Directive (EU) 2019/633 is a directive, so each member state transposed it into its own law. French negotiation rules are national law and change often. Check the current rules for a specific market with counsel before relying on a date.

ICA’s calendar is used here because it is published. Other chains run different cycles, and a chain’s calendar can change from one year to the next.

How approaches to chains are organised market by market is set out on business development in Europe.

Sources

Label	Value	Source
Who decides the central assortment at ICA	the category manager in each area	ICA Gruppen, information for central suppliers, opened 2026-09-21
ICA revision calendar 2026	twelve revision windows, replacing the ECR-coordinated process with nine, which ended at the turn of 2025 to 2026	ICA supplier portal, Användarmanual Revidering (user manual, assortment revision), opened 2026-09-21
ICA revision sequence	week 1 notification and article information; weeks 3 to 4 supplier presentation; weeks 5 to 8 listing decision; weeks 9 to 11 detailed listing decision; weeks 9 to 15 preparation for launch or phase-out; week 16 start	ICA, Användarmanual Revidering, opened 2026-09-21
ICA first supplier deadlines	26 September for the January 2026 window; 12 December for the April 2026 window; dairy revised in the windows dated 9 February and 7 September 2026	ICA, Användarmanual Revidering, opened 2026-09-21
French signature deadline, general rule	commercial agreements required by the Code de commerce must be signed by 1 March at the latest	Bignon Lebray, Hebdo des Négos n°6, 20 February 2026 (law firm publication), opened 2026-09-21
French deadline for smaller suppliers	Loi n° 2026-796 of 18 August 2026: 31 January for suppliers with worldwide annual turnover below 350 million euros excluding VAT; general terms of sale by 30 November; experiment for agreements concluded 1 January 2027 to 31 December 2029; 1 March still applies above the threshold; not applicable to wholesalers	La Cité des Entreprises, négociations commerciales 2027, opened 2026-09-21
European retail alliances	typically no joint buying; joint tenders for private label and on-top agreements with large brand suppliers; examples AgeCore, Coopernic	European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Retail alliances in the agricultural and food supply chain, 2020, opened 2026-09-21
Eurelec	buying joint venture formed by REWE and E. Leclerc in 2016; negotiates and purchases goods from a selected list of large brand manufacturers; described as the only European alliance engaging in joint buying	JRC, Retail alliances, 2020, p. 10, opened 2026-09-21
Retail concentration, 2016	five-firm concentration ratio from 35 percent in Greece to 90 percent in Finland	JRC, Retail alliances, 2020, section 2.2, citing McCorriston 2019, opened 2026-09-21
Unfair trading practices, banned	payment later than 30 days for perishables and 60 days for other agri-food products; short-notice cancellations of perishables; unilateral contract changes	European Commission, DG Agriculture, unfair trading practices, opened 2026-09-21
Unfair trading practices, allowed if agreed beforehand	returns of unsold products; supplier payments for stocking, display, listing, promotion and marketing	European Commission, DG Agriculture, opened 2026-09-21
Protected suppliers and transposition	turnover up to 350 million euros; all 27 member states transposed by December 2022	European Commission, DG Agriculture, opened 2026-09-21
Late payment default	businesses pay within 60 days unless expressly agreed otherwise, provided the term is not grossly unfair to the creditor; public authorities within 30 days, 60 in very exceptional circumstances	European Commission, late payment, opened 2026-09-21; “not grossly unfair” wording from Directive 2011/7/EU, Article 3(5), text as retained at legislation.gov.uk, opened 2026-09-21