The "REWE voll pflanzlich" store on Warschauer Brücke in the Friedrichshain district offers more than 2,700 vegan products. After more than 3,800 stores offering everything from organic vegetables to cheese and meat, this is REWE's first vegan store. Experience the new store here in our film.
Peter Maly, Management Board member of REWE Group, sees the plant-based supermarket as an important test: "With 'REWE voll pflanzlich', we are showing how varied and large the selection of vegan products is. In the past, we have been recognised several times as a vegan pioneer in the food trade, and we are also encouraged by the strong response from our customers."
The product range in the usual REWE stores includes up to 1,400 vegan items and has grown considerably in recent years. Milk alternatives and fresh convenience products have proved to be particularly popular. Peter Maly: "There are twice as many products in our plant-based supermarket as in the usual REWE range. First and foremost, we hope to achieve learning effects for our traditional supermarkets. Here at Warschauer Brücke in Berlin-Friedrichshain, we have the opportunity to pave the way for even more new products and brands to reach the supermarket shelves. We are very excited!"
At the opening of the new store in Berlin (from left): Dennis Henkelmann (Store Manager), Stefan Hörning (Chairman of the Management Board of REWE Ost), Franziska Giffey (Berlin's Mayor and Senator for Economics, Energy and Public Enterprises) and Peter Maly (Management Board of REWE Group). © pivopix - Christoph Große
Berlin's Mayor and Senator for Economics, Energy and Public Enterprises, Franziska Giffey, said at the opening: "Berlin is the right place for innovation, and that also applies to new retail concepts. With an entire store offering purely plant-based products, REWE is showing just how wide the variety of diets is now and can test customer demand in Berlin. After all, people's shopping behaviour is changing and we are living and eating much more consciously today. This is also reflected on the shelves of our stores in a range that is becoming ever broader and caters to people's different needs. I wish the store and its employees every success and good luck."
The "REWE voll pflanzlich" in Berlin is compact and clearly laid out with 212 square metres of sales space. The range of plant-based food and drugstore products is all the larger: there is space for over 2,700 items from around 300 brands. The own brands REWE Bio + vegan, REWE Bio, REWE Beste Wahl and Vivess are prominently represented. These include REWE's most successful plant-based products such as the oat drink, smoked tofu and falafel balls from REWE Bio + vegan.
With Rügenwalder, Oatly and Alpro, well-known brands can be found alongside young companies such as Not Guilty with certified organic sweets, for foodies with dips and sauces and Greenforce with vegan Leberkäse and Köttbullar.
There is a wide selection with more than 50 items from the bedda, bettr and Koro brands. Products from BioVegan are exclusively available - from baking mixes to dressings and pasta toppings. Organic crisps from Heimatgut, cornflakes from Wholey and bowls from Goodbank come directly from Berlin. For the first time at REWE, there is vegan eggnog from the Berlin spirits manufacturer Mampe. Another speciality is the ice cream machine, which customers can use to make plant-based soft ice cream.
Everything for the green weekly shop
"If you're looking for a snack on the go or simply want to try something new, you've come to the right place. We also have everything you need for your weekly shop," says Dennis Henkelmann, who runs the market. "Our range is colourful, with everything from vegan burger sauce, ramen and wines to various snacks. We are a real supermarket, only purely plant-based."
Dennis Henkelmann (© pivopix - Christoph Große)
The self-employed businessman relies on a team of twelve employees at "REWE voll pflanzlich". They have all been specially trained in the plant-based range so that they can provide customers with the best possible advice. Henkelmann was born in Berlin and already runs a REWE store in the neighbourhood.
"The supermarket is right next to the S-Bahn, and there are lots of flats and offices around it. That's why we deliberately focus on a wide range of baked goods. We have more than 40 products, from vegan Franzbrötchen and Laugenbagel to Sunday rolls," says Dennis Henkelmann.
At "REWE voll pflanzlich", there are three self-checkout counters where customers scan their purchases themselves. Thanks to "Scan&Go", they can scan their groceries as they walk along the shelves using a hand scanner or smartphone and place them in their shopping trolley.
Visual eye-catcher: neon meets nature
In addition to the exclusively plant-based foods on the shelves, one thing is particularly striking about "REWE voll pflanzlich": the look. Bright yellow meets lush green and warm rust red. Colourful triangles stretch from the ceiling to the floor.
Stefan Hörning, Chairman of the management of REWE Ost: "The 'REWE voll pflanzlich' is an eye-catcher. Lively, eye-catching, natural - these are the keywords that have driven us. We have special products, including lots of fresh produce. You can try out new things here, many of the products in our range are organic. Here, young companies with new ideas have the chance to get one of the coveted places on the supermarket shelf."
Another eye-catcher is the logo. "We were able to give the familiar red REWE logo a new look for the first time. We added the simple addition 'fully plant-based' to the green letters. This allows us to get to the heart of what's inside the shop without any frills."
Thanks to its wide range of plant-based products in its supermarkets, REWE has been a pioneer in food retail for several years, as shown by independent rankings such as the Albert Schweitzer Foundation (2023) and the PETA Vegan Food Award (2021). A GfK survey commissioned by REWE last autumn showed that plant-based foods have long been part of many consumers' everyday lives. More than half of the approximately 1,000 respondents stated that they had already purchased vegan alternatives.
Just under 27 per cent said that they replace animal products with plant-based alternatives at least several times a week. The most common reason for buying plant-based products was that 54 per cent simply wanted to try them out. In the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture's 2023 Nutrition Report, curiosity was also the most frequently cited reason (73 per cent). The representative survey also showed that the popularity of plant-based alternatives has been steadily increasing since 2015.
© pivopix - Christoph Große
Name: REWE voll pflanzlich
Address: Warschauer Straße 33, 10243 Berlin (S + U Warschauer Brücke)
Opening hours: Monday to Saturday 7-22 h
Web: www.rewe-vollpflanzlich.de
Both German and English comments appear here.
Wow, I've never been so envious of Berlin. The next one in Cologne, please :-)
Good morning, Franziska Giffey (Mayor of Berlin and Senator for Economics, Energy and Public Enterprises) Mrs Giffey is not the Mayor of Berlin, Kay Wegener is. MfG A. Naujack
not quite true - Kay Wegener is Governing Mayor. Ms Giffey is still mayor. www.berlin.de/sen/web/ueber-uns/leitung-und-organisation/senatorin-franziska-giffey/ Franziska Giffey was Governing Mayor of Berlin from 21 December 2021 to 27 April 2023. Since 27 April 2023, Franziska Giffey has been Senator for Economics, Energy and Public Enterprises and Mayor of Berlin.
I'll be in Berlin in a fortnight' time to do a store check. I'm really looking forward to it.
Very, very cool!!!! I would love to have something like this in NRW!
I'm already looking forward to my next visit to Berlin, where I will definitely make a stop and shop without looking at the ingredients list. Thank you and hopefully soon in Cologne and everywhere :-)
Super good!!! And the store design is also really appealing! Something new :-) Keep up the good work!