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SHOPPING

Supermarkets in Norway: What are the best loyalty schemes?

Grocery shopping in Norway is amongst the most expensive in Europe. Luckily, there are plenty of generous bonus schemes to help you get more bang for your buck when you hit the shops. Here’s everything you need to know to make the most of loyalty cards.

Published: 20 April 2021 11:56 CEST
Updated: 15 February 2022 15:18 CET
Supermarkets in Norway: What are the best loyalty schemes?
Photo by Anna Shvets from Pexels

Æ-Rema 1000

Rema 1000 opened its first store in Trondheim in 1979 and has become one of Norway’s largest supermarket chains.

Rema’s loyalty scheme is a smartphone app that anyone over the age of 15 with a Norwegian mobile number and a smartphone can use.

Unfortunately, the app isn’t available in English, so you best practice your Norwegian if you are going to capitalise on the savings on offer.

On the bright side, the discounts you receive are well worth it, especially if you have young children, as the app offers a 25 percent discount on all nappies (or diapers for the non-Brits reading).

In addition to this, you receive 10 percent off all fresh fruit and vegetables and 10 percent off of your 10 most frequently bought items, meaning you can save money on the things you buy the most.

You can also sign up for their personal price cut scheme, whereby you receive tailor-made promotions. However, you must first approve this in the app under your profile.

To get these discounts, you must have the app and scan your personal barcode at the checkout or register a bank card in the app.

The app is available on both Apple and Google Play stores.

Trumf- Kiwi/Meny/Joker/Spar

Trumf covers three supermarket chains in Norway as well as convenience-store-cum-supermarket Joker.

With Trumf you get cashback, or a “Trumf bonus”, every time you shop. The Trumf bonus/cashback is deposited straight into your Trumf account after making a purchase with a card linked to your Trumf account.

Alternatively, you can present your unique barcode via the app at checkout.

To become a Trumf member, you will need to have a Norwegian phone number and bank account. You will then need to link a debit card to your account.

One perk of Trumf is you can also invite somebody to form a joint Trumf account. This means that you can create a joint pot with your partner, for example.

All the supermarkets affiliated with Trumf offer a one percent bonus on shopping. This equates to roughly one percent cashback value of the items you buy.

On certain days, usually Thursday’s, Triple Trumf is activated, which means 3 percent back on all purchases; you’ll typically receive a heads up via text or email so you can plan a big shop to make the most of Triple Trumf.

Here is an overview of how the bonus points work for each store:

KIWI:

  • One percent back on all groceries
  • Three percent back on Triple Trumf
  • 15 percent back on all fresh fruit, vegetables, and freshly packaged fish

Spar:

  • One percent back on all groceries
  • Three percent back on Triple Trumf
  • Free coupons on selected products
  • 25 percent discount on all baby food and nappies

Meny:

  • One percent back on all groceries
  • Three percent back on Triple Trumf
  • Personal offer coupons

Joker:

  • One percent back on all groceries
  • Three percent back on Triple Trumf
  • Five percent back Monday

It isn’t just groceries either, Trumf can be used on everything from fuel to fashion. You can download the app on both Apple and Android.

The biggest advantage of Trumf is the freedom of deciding how to use your Trumf bonus.

You can choose to receive the cashback directly into your bank account, have the money deducted off of the total next time you shop at your chosen store, convert it to SAS EuroBonus points for your next trip away, or make a charitable donation.

READ MORE: The essential phone apps you need to travel around Norway 

Like Æ, you’ll have to brush up on your Norwegian to make the most of the app.

Coop

To access Coop’s loyalty discounts, you’ll have to become a member and part-owner of the business. The big drawback to this is that to become a member you’ll have to pay 300 kroner to become a part-owner.

However, once you’re a member, it’s worth the initial outlay. 

To begin with you will get a one percent purchase dividend, in the form of cashback, on everything you purchase. The dividend is automatically credited to your member account and you can earn a small amount of interest on it.The dividends are transferred into your account once a year.

As a member, you’ll also get exclusive access to special deals on well-known brands. The discounts cover everything from thermals to kitchenware and electronics.

In addition to this, you’ll get discount vouchers for frequently bought items.

To sign up, you’ll need a Norwegian phone number and D-number. To use your membership, you can use a mobile phone app at the checkout or with a physical membership card.

One problem is that while there are many discounts and dividends opportunities to take advantage of, it can be confusing to know what perk can be used where, as Coop divides its deals up between its Mega, Extra, and Prix stores. Thankfully, we’ve taken care of that for you with this guide for what benefit applies where:

  • Extra: 20 percent dividend on baby products and 11 dividend on fruit and vegetables
  • PRIX: 25 percent discount on all men’s products
  • MEGA: 20 percent dividend on organic food and vegetarian food.

There’s also a one kroner bonus every time you reuse a Coop bag at stores.

Own an electric car? There’ll be eight percent dividend if you use Mer charging stations.

If you’re still on fuel power to get you from A-to-B, then there are also bonuses for filling up with Circle K or YX.

This year Coop paid out 1.3 billion kroner worth of dividends to its members based on how much they spent in-store in 2020.

You can use the Coop app on either Apple or Android.

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COST OF LIVING

How long will food prices remain high in Norway?

In the last 12 months, prices in Norway have risen by 6.4 percent. This increase was fuelled – to a considerable extent – by soaring food and drink prices. How long will this trend persist?

Published: 10 May 2023 15:14 CEST
How long will food prices remain high in Norway?

On Wednesday, Statistics Norway (SSB) released figures on price growth in the country over the past twelve months.

From April 2022 to April 2023, prices in Norway rose 6.4 percent. The SSB pointed out that food and drink prices contributed significantly to the high price increase, while electricity prices slowed price growth.

The figures show that increased food prices contributed the most to the inflation in the last year: from April 2022 to April 2023, the prices of food and non-alcoholic beverages rose by 10.5 percent.

Between March and April 2023, food and non-alcoholic beverage prices rose by 2.5 percent.

“Only once before has a larger monthly change been measured from March to April, so this may indicate that something more than just the price spike after the Easter offers is fuelling the big price rise,” section manager Espen Kristiansen at the SSB said.

How long will food prices continue to increase?

Many industry experts believe that the worst in terms of food price increases is yet to come, as prices have been artificially low in several big chains due to competition in the run-up to Easter.

Norwegian supermarkets had gone through a price war that started in February when they froze prices on hundreds of products despite increased costs from suppliers and foreign markets.

However, this competition mostly ended by the end of April due to special offers expiring.

READ MORE: Food bills likely to rise as Norwegian retailers end price guarantee offers

Now, supermarkets are expected to raise prices to account for the increased costs from suppliers and costs in foreign countries from which Norway imports food.

Several industry experts believe the chains will draw out price increases over a few months to avoid consumer backlash.

Signs of inflation flattening out

Financial analysts believe that, while inflation remains problematic, there have been signs of it flattening in the overall economy.

“Price growth is still high, but in recent months we have seen signs of a flattening,” section manager Espen Kristiansen at the SSB said.

Kyrre M. Knudsen at Sparebank 1 SR-Bank agrees: “Price growth has stabilised and not continued to grow as many have feared. However, it has really taken hold at a level that is sky-high above the target.”

However, despite signs of stabilisation, the fact remains that the rise in prices is higher than expected – which will very likely lead to more interest rate hikes.

“I think the Central Bank is concerned that prices outside of energy continued to rise instead of falling back in April. The most important reasons are, of course, a weak krone and high wage negotiation settlements, but today’s inflation figures join the series of factors that point towards a higher interest rate peak that was originally expected,” chief economist Kjersti Haugland at DNB Markets told Norwegian newswire NTB on Wednesday.

Haugland says the new SSB price growth figures strengthen DNB’s expectation that there will be three more interest rate hikes this year – in June, August, and September so that the key policy rate ends up at 4 percent.

Commercial banks tend to follow the interest rate hikes made by Norway’s Central Bank (Norges Bank), which means that mortgage loan repayments are also likely to become more expensive this year.

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