Rewe breaks away from lean period

Two years ago, Rewe secured around 36.6 percent of the shares in the beverage delivery service Durststrecke. Now the group is getting out and wants to concentrate on its core competencies again.

According to information from Lebensmittel Zeitung, Rewe has sold its shares in beverage delivery start-up Durststrecke. The buyer and new majority shareholder is GFGH Direkt. In total, the investment company now owns around 96 percent of the shares.

Rewe had been a shareholder in Durststrecke since February 2020, holding 36.6 percent of the shares in the beverage delivery service. At that time, the retail group had invested in the start-up to enter the beverage home delivery market, in which Flaschenpost is also active. That apparently failed. Rewe justifies the sale of its Durststrecke shares by saying it wants to focus on growth in other areas in the future.

Simon Biela and Matthias Steinforth founded Durststrecke in 2017, allowing customers to order drinks via the start-up's Durst.de delivery platform. Local beverage retailers then deliver the ordered goods. Durststrecke operates in Bremen, Chemnitz, Dresden, Frankfurt, Cologne, Leverkusen, Munich and Offenbach. Other major cities are to follow.