Istanbul Municipality agreed to establish a similar organization in Turkey such as Migros, establishment known as “King of Cheapness” in Switzerland, by taking a historical decision in 1954 in the face of growing population of Istanbul, wage gap between Istanbul city center and surrounding neighborhoods and increasing cost of living. Thus the way opened to present the food and supplies to the public with the most favorable price and quality under the control of municipality. Migros mobile sales trucks circulating in neighborhood districts not just took the need of people to their foot but also became a unique “city entertainment” for the children... Migros introduced with the sine qua non of the today’s modern retail elements such as first hygienic packaging, first label and shelf life application with Turkish consumers in this period.

Koç Holding, one of the most important groups in Turkey, took over the majority shares of Migros in 1975 with the desire and direction of the founder, Vehbi Koç and fast going retail period Migros has been started so as to embrace all the consumers in Turkey within years starting from Istanbul. Migros has created the required infrastructure for a healthy distribution of the fruits and vegetables to reach to the consumers in an economical way with the gigantic center depot established at this period and with the development of the fruit and vegetable offices.

Main depot of Migros came into service with the various additions and improvements in 1981, investments have been made for the preparation of the products such as dry legumes to sales by hygienic storing and packaging in a healthy way and meat processing center entered into commissioning. Migros who opened 4 stores in Izmir except Istanbul for the first time in 1988 launched the infrastructure works for Aegean Region. Migros has been adopted with “Honest Trader” identity by the consumers with the economical prices and quality sanitary products which gives service in 2 major cities with 34 stores at the end of 1989.

Following the outward oriented economic policy of Turkey, Migros had made good analyses on the changing demands and expectations of Turkish consumer and started to big merchandising business starting from the end of 1990. MM and MMM Migros stores have been opened consecutively and it also started a new implementation of open store until 22:00 on the weekends. Migros has brought the part time working concept for the first time in the Turkish work force market in this period and also implemented the staff training programs. Again, by launching an industry-first application Migroskop, began to announce the advantageous and cheap exchange. Migros stores which went through fully automation, introduced the Turkish consumers, with the computerized, auto-scaled cash registers. Migros became a publicly traded company in 1991 and created the brand of “Sok” in 1995 which is the first discount brand of Turkey. Migros brought together the first “private label” products with “Migros” brand with the customers and again scored another first with the possibility of credit card shopping. Migros , which initiated the “Migros from customer’s perspective” studies with the customer satisfaction surveys for the first time in Turkey, met with its customers with 75 stores and Sok stores in 5 regions so as to be in Marmara, Aegean, Mediterranean, Central Anatolia and Southeast in its 40th years of anniversary. Migros thus spread the modern retail practices which it started from Istanbul by offering the products and services in the same standard to its customers on far and wide of Turkey. Migros completed the infrastructure works for the international moves in this period.

Migros, which came together with its consumers in Erzurum in 1996 in line with the expansion attack in Turkey, has opened its first abroad store Baku Ramstore in the same year. Migros opened another store in Moscow after Baku and continued to reunite the consumers with the first practices in retail. MMM Migros Caddebostan, which was opened at the end of 1996 in Istanbul Caddebostan became the first store in which the electronic shelf label used. Migros, also created the concept of “Migros Shopping Center” which presented a new shopping media to its customers starting from 1997. Migros Shopping Center Beylikduzu and Ramstore Shopping Center Moscow became the first samples. In 1997 Migros, became a pioneer of internet shopping and brought into life the Migros Virtual Market. Thus became the first retail company serving internet shopping opportunity starting from Istanbul and Izmir. It added shopping center and Virtual Market to its activities which it carried out through Migros stores, Sok Discount Markets and sales trucks in 1997 and became serving in all store forms in retail sector. In 1998, Migros customers met with the advantages of Migros Club Card which is the first loyalty card application in the sector. Migros reached to 325 stores in total in 7 geographical regions as of end of 1999 with the growth rate of 2 new stores in a week. Opened the biggest shopping center of Turkey in Ankara, and Turkish consumers are presented with the “self-service check out” system for the first time in Turkey and in Europe in the hypermarket in this shopping center. It was rapidly growing in abroad and became to serve with 12 Ramstores in 3 countries such as Azerbaijan, Russia and Kazakhstan. Migros Club Card member number reached to 3.2 million as of end of 2000 and “Free Shopping Cheque” with the total amount of 2.7 trillion TL has been given to 575,000 people in 2000. Virtual Market expanded by growing in Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir in line with the received demands. Migros opened 128 stores at home and abroad in several regions and increased its store number to 450. Migros created the “Bakkalım” store which is its 7th format and opened Bakkalım in nearly 700 points within a short time. Migros, which considers the development of its employees as a modern retail company, opened Koç University – Migros Retail shopping Training Center in 2000 and its first graduates received their certificates.

Migros, which brought service to 160 million customers with the store number up to 461 as of 2001, on the other hand accelerating its going retail period with Moscow centric, increased its store number from 9 to 15 in 1 year. Migros Virtual Market in which the online shopping is carried out added Antalya and Adana among the service network to its scope in Istanbul, Izmir, Ankara, Bursa, Marmaris, Bodrum in 2001. Migros, which has desire to present all kinds of innovations to its Consumers served to service Migros Wholesale Market which provides the wholesale selling from internet, B2B which provides corporate purchases and www.kangurum.com which provides fast, economic, reliable and controlled internet access in this period. Migros, which started its investment with Diyarbakir in Southeast Anatolia in 2002, added Kars and Erzincan to its East investments in 2003 and continued to expand its service network. At the same time, strengthened its presence in Black Sea with the investments in the cities such as Ordu, Trabzon.
Migros, which adopted as a principle to serve the best and most beautiful to its personnel, investor and supplier celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2004 with a great enthusiasm in Turkey wide. Migros celebrated the 50th year in September with a special evening, burned the retail torch in Galata Bridge from which it started to its journey with the signals of 20 sales trucks in order to create a leadership in modern retail sector in Turkey. Migros Switzerland brought the sales truck with number 1 in 1930 to Turkey and presented to M.Koç Museum for the 50th year of Migros. History of 50 years of Migros Ticaret A.S. has been recorded with a documentary called “50 years of Pleasant Shopping” which presented a historical view to the shopping habits, lived phases, eras, changes in the preferences and transformation of Turkish consumers. Migros acquired Tansas which is a retail chain with a quantum leap in 2005 and riveted its leadership in the sector and continued to serve its customers with the brands differing with various formats along with the synergy created with this merger. Migros, which served with 505 stores in total at home at the end of 2005 has reached to 566 stores in total with the help of abroad affiliates. This number reached to 722 with the Tansas stores.

Migros Ticaret A.S., which accessed to its customers with Migros, Tansas, Sok, Macrocenter and Kangurum brands following the merger with Tansas, maintained the exclusivity and distinctiveness of each format with the skill to manage the multiple formats and responded to different expectations and needs. Its capability to stand close to the customers has increased. Migros Ticaret A.S. rapidly increased the number of stores and expanded its geographical presence in all formats locally and internationally in order to grow more following the merger. Migros introduced 5M hypermarkets i.e. the new format that accommodates free shopping areas and hyper cheapness, to its customers in 2007, thus improved its capability to offer differentiated services in all retail sale formats. While it stepped into the cities such as Kastamonu, Nevsehir, Karabuk and Zonguldak and the Western Black Sea Region within the country, it continued to open new Ramstores in Russia and surroundings internationally. It expanded the scope of services to 57 cities as of the end of 2007. Migros Ticaret A.S. that owns 15 Ramstores i.e. 3 in Azerbaijan, 9 in Kazakhstan, 1 in Kyrgyzstan and 2 in Macedonia abroad sold Ramstores in Russia and left out Russian operation successfully. This growth pace of Migros locally and internationally with the velocity of opening 3 stores per week enabled Migros to be listed at 236th place for the first time from Turkey in Global Forces of Retail Sale 2008 report prepared every year regularly by Deloitte. Migros Ticaret A.S. took 12th place among 50 companies that grew the fastest during 2001-2006.

Transfer of the shares of Migros Ticaret A.S. to Moonlight Perakendecilik ve Ticaret A.S., which is the affiliate in Turkey of Moonlight Capital S.A., was completed on 30 May 2008. It declared the new growth route in October 2008 when it was the outset for the word financing markets to have fluctuations. Migros, which always offered the world of privileges and innovations to its customers, initiated very special applications in the retail sale business in 55th year and started a new era and declared that all consumption items would be under Migros warranty for lifetime. In the same period, it succeeded to rise to 190th place in “Global Forces of Retail Sale 2009” report. Migros Ticaret A.S., which supported the rapid growth plan with the innovative applications to create value for the customers, adopted the plastic bag that can dissolve in the nature for the first time in 2009 by breaking grounds in Turkey. Subsequently, it supported this event with the project of fabric bag that can be reused. “Jet pay desks” that enabled the customers to have a different shopping experience with joyful and easy use were offered to the Turkish consumers for the first time by Migros. Migros started to ship directly to the stores the fresh food in 2010 through the distribution centers that were spread rapidly throughout Turkey. Thus, it both increased productivity, and created the opportunity of faster logistics even to the furthest corners of the country. Migros realized the “Good Agricultural Practices” project led by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs in January 2010. With this project, Migros declared that it would bring to the fruit and vegetable sections the products with “GPA Logo” manufactured by the agreed farmers conforming to the quality and hygiene standards according to 214 different criteria. One of the innovations realized successively by Migros was “Easy Pay Desk”. Migros Ticaret A.S. that had initiated the application of ATM within the store before offered the customers to pay for the invoices of many authorities at the pay desks of all Migros, Tansas, Sok, 5M and Macrocenter stores with the application of “Easy Pay Desk”.

3 million wastes were collected in 2.5 years by means of “Environment-Friendly Kiosks”. Migros Club Card that was initiated by Migros Ticaret as the application first loyalty card was spread to all formats and it was started to be implemented under the name i.e. “Money Club”. The number of members reached 8.5 million. Migros Ticaret A.S. continued to lead the technological innovations in 2011 as well. The application of “Mobile Market” where the consumers can get the barcodes on the box of any product read by their mobile phones and fill in their shopping baskets in the way they wish and from any place they desire was adopted. Migros transferred Sok Cheapness Markets to Gozde Financial Services in August. 5M stores expanded in Adana and Inegol in the second quarter. Istanbul Akbati 5M was inaugurated... Migros Virtual Market grew 3 times in the last two years. In July, Antalya Terra City i.e. the first store of Macrocenter format outside Istanbul was inaugurated. Migros Ticaret focused on Aegean and Mediterranean Regions with Tansas Stores in 2011 and took the decision to grow in these regions. Tansas inaugurated 6 stores in the last 6 days in August. M-Jets took their place in the sector as the most practical and fastest form of supermarket. 3200 items of products were offered for sale at M-Jets, the smallest of which covered 150 m2. Migros initiated the era of “Thematic Shopping” for the first time in Turkey at the end of 2011. The first theme was the “Nostalgia Campaign” of Migros by virtue of its 57th Anniversary. With this campaign, many rooted brands of the country met the customers again with the design and prices of 50 years ago.