The Hungarian Competition Authority is investigating Aldi’s market leadership claims.

According to the information, the GVH noticed that the company had been using the claims “Widest selection!” and “Best deals!” in its commercial communications since March this year. The company based the claims on its first place in a competition several months earlier, but this is probably not enough to objectively, factually prove market leadership. Aldi presented its winning the competition in a way that was likely to mislead consumers and cause them to make decisions that they would not have made otherwise, the competition authority said.

The initiation of competition supervision proceedings does not mean that the undertaking has committed the infringement, the proceedings are aimed at clarifying the facts and thereby proving the alleged infringement. The period provided for conducting the proceedings is three months, which can be extended twice, in justified cases, by a maximum of two months each time.

In its announcement, the GVH drew the attention of undertakings that market leadership claims may only be used if the undertaking has objective data at the time of publishing the advertisement that clearly supports this.

The national competition authority recalled that at the beginning of 2024 it also imposed a competition supervision fine of HUF 90 million on Lidl for using market leadership claims.