Egypt-based discount supermarket chain Kazyon has extended its partnership with IFC with a $30m loan to support the expansion of Kazyon’s store network in Morocco. The move will heat up an already competitive proximity discount supermarket segment, which includes Kazyon, BiM and LabelVie’s Supeco format.
Kazyon entered Morocco in October 2023 and has now opened more than 150 stores as well as a distribution centre. Most of its stores are in Casablanca, but it also has stores in Rabat and Mohammedia. It is the retailer’s second market after Egypt.
Kazyon was founded in Egypt in 2014. Kazyon has now opened more than 1,008 stores across 22 governates and has overtaken BiM, which had 418 stores at the end of 2024. In May 2023, Kazyon received a $165m equity investment from private equity company DPI to drive rapid expansion and subsequently opened a large number of new stores.
In both Egypt and Morocco, Kazyon competes directly with Turkish proximity discount chain BiM. BiM entered Morocco in 2009 and quickly built a strong network of stores, mostly in Casablanca. However, it hit problems with the Moroccan government, which threatened to shut the stores down unless BiM reduced its dependency on imported Turkish products and stocked more Moroccan products.
In December 2020 Helios Investment Partners acquired a 35% stake in BIM’s Moroccan business, at the time BiM had 534 stores in Morocco. Since then, BiM has also accelerated growth. In January 2024, BiM had 693 stores in Morocco. In March 2025 it has 818 stores and is the market leader in small format proximity retail. Kazyon wants to take it on directly, planning 200 outlets by the end of 2025 and talking about having a network of 600 stores by the end of 2027.
The other player in discount in Morocco, LabelVie, also plans significant growth in proximity retail with its Carrefour Market/Express and Supeco formats. In 2024, LabelVie opened 91 stores, of which 73 were in Q4 2024. 84 of the 91 new stores were either Supeco or Carrefour Market or Express stores, both of which are small format, proximity stores. LabelVie also added 6 new Atacadao discounter hypermarkets. By 2028, LabelVie plans to have opened 953 stores, compared up from 270 stores in 2024. Within this, LabelVie is looking to have 49 Atacadao stores, just 18 Carrefour hypermarkets but 477 Carrefour Market and Carrefour Express stores (both smaller format, convenience stores) and 409 Supeco stores.
Read more: Kazyon receives a $30m IFC loan to fund expansion of its store network in Morocco - Trendtype
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