Case Study 10.1 Trolley’s Up for Caddie
The business brand ‘Caddie’ has existed for some time, yet it represents one of many companies that
most people have never heard of, despite the fact that products sold under the ‘Caddie’ brand are
supplied to airport, healthcare, hospitality, logistics and retail customers. The Caddie brand is owned by
the French firm ‘Les Ateliers Réunis’ S.A.S., which has its head office and main production facility at
Drusenheim, France. Founded in 1928, the company first used its wire-processing skills to supply the
poultry industry. Its core expertise is still based on steel wire, but this has been extended to the
manipulation of and combination with other materials, such as plastics, to create, for example, carts, roll
cages and trolleys which can be used to move and store, amongst other things, retail merchandise (not
chickens!). Though you might not recognize the name, the ‘Caddie’ brand is registered in over 70
countries and the company uses a network of 130 agents to target potential customers around the world.
Major retail clients include Aldi, Carrefour and Weldom, and if you happen to fly via Paris Charles de
Gaulle or Orly airports then you will likely push one of the trolleys that the company designed and built.
Further afield, as you make your way through Cairo airport, you will find yourself offloading your case
from the luggage belt onto one of Caddie’s trolleys in the arrivals lounge.
Caddie’s retail interests extend beyond trolleys into retail shelving and displays, into technology for
moving merchandise around. Looking at trolleys themselves, they may seem quite simple but they are
important in the retail experience; try carrying more than six items in your arms and you will see the
need. The facilitating role can be particularly acute at an airport; after the car park, the trolley may be
the first real contact that a traveller has with the airport and it is certainly what brings them from the
outside world right into the heart of the airport experience. The facilitating role at its most functional,
of course, is embodied in those workhorses of retail replenishment, the roll cage. The alternative to
transporting upwards of 500 kg of merchandise is many trips to and from the stock room – not a recipe
for retail efficiency.
Caddie’s range of products for storing and transporting items serve different needs, according to sector.
