Organización Soriana is a Mexican public company and a major retailer in Mexico with more than 824 stores. Soriana is a grocery and department store retail chain headquartered in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico. The company is 100% capitalized in Mexico and has been publicly traded on the Mexican stock exchange (Bolsa Mexicana de Valores), since 1987 under the symbol: "Soriana". Overview Soriana was founded in 1968 by Mexican entrepreneurs and brothers, Francisco and Armando Martín Borque, in Torreón, Coahuila. The company currently, as of 2013, operates under the brands Soriana, Clubes City Club, Hipermart, Mercado Soriana, and Super City. Super City is the company's convenience store division brand. It operates supermarkets and department stores for consumer and wholesale markets. Soriana competes primarily with H-E-B, La Comer, Chedraui, S-Mart and Walmex. Soriana emphasizes that it is Mexican-owned and operated. It is not uncommon to see advertising circulars from competitors Wal-Mart, Bodega Aurrerá, Superama, Chedraui, Alsuper or H-E-B posted around the store with certain items highlighted, pointing out that these items are cheaper at Soriana, a common practice in retail store environments. On December 6, 2007, Organizacion Soriana acquired Supermercados Gigante for US$1.35 billion. In 2008, Soriana replaced the existing Gigante stores including its seven stores in the United States (U.S. stores were sold in May to Chedraui). Most Mexican stores retained Supermercados Gigante props like point of sale systems and food equipment. In 2012, it had more than 606 stores in 208 cities in Mexico under 5 store formats, which include 249 Soriana Híper, 105 Soriana Súper, 147 Mercado Soriana, 72 Soriana Express and 33 City Club. It also had 14 distribution centers. In 2006, for reporting and administrative purposes, Soriana moved its headquarters from Torreón to Monterrey. Store formats Soriana Híper Soriana's flagship format created in 1968, whose store formats are hypermarkets that focus on consumers located in cities with more than 150,000 inhabitants, which have a sales floor area of 4,000 to 11,000 m2. They operate under the retail sales scheme, in which they handle a wide assortment of merchandise with 50,000 SKU's from the clothing, general merchandise, grocery and perishable food divisions. They have a shopping center made up of 40 or 50 small stores that the Company rents to third parties, who market products and services to the consumer. Its main competitors are: Walmart Supercenter (Walmart) (Main competitor nationwide) Chedraui from Grupo Comercial Chedraui Casa Ley (Hypermarket)