Woolworths (Australia) facts for kids
A Woolworths store in Mount Barker, South Australia
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Subsidiary | |
Industry | Retail |
Founded | 1924 |
Headquarters |
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Australia
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Key people
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Michael Luscombe, CEO |
Revenue | Sales of A$42.3 Billion (2007) |
Number of employees
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175,000 |
Parent | Woolworths Limited |
Woolworths is a group of Australian supermarkets. It is known by locals as 'Woolies'. It is the largest supermarket chain in Australia.
As of October 2008, the business had 780 Australian supermarkets and 667 liquor stores in Australia. It owns 201 supermarkets in New Zealand. It also owns 271 hotels and the discount department store chain Big W and an electronics retail chain Dick Smith.
Shops in Victoria used to be known as Safeway until 2008, when Woolworths Limited announced that all Safeway stores would become Woolworths stores in line with the rest of Australia. The New South Wales company had taken over the Victorian chain in the 1980s but had not changed the shop names (and in fact rebranded existing Woolworths stores as Safeway). In August 2008 there were 189 supermarkets in Victoria that were to be changed from being called Safeway to Woolworths.
Woolworths was the first Australian supermarket to offer petrol discounts when a certain amount of money was spent in the shop.
In 2009 Apple launched a legal challenge against Woolworths, claiming their logo, resembling a curl of fruit peel in the shape of a 'w', was superficially similar to the Apple logo.
On 11 March 2020, due to the COVID-19 Pandemic to legacy shooting of enhanced community quarantine, The supermarket is temporarily disallowed.