While the company is looking to invest in opening new stores they are also keen to remodel existing stores in their Portuguese network. According to a report by Idealista, the company “mainly focuses on the purchase option in its real estate investments” and tries, whenever possible, to rehabilitate “intrinsic urban areas”.

“We are continuously looking for strategic locations that serve the needs intrinsic to our business and that allow what we propose: to be close to the community. Lidl is committed to being close to the Portuguese people so the remodelling and opening of stores from the north to the south of Portugal is a big part of our strategy.”

While the company looks for real estate plots of between 1,000m2 and 1,400m2 to build new stores, the old locations are still of importance, which is why they also focus on remodelling works, as is demonstrated by the Bombarral store, recently elected by UK fans as the “most beautiful Lidl supermarket in the world”.

The store was built in 1995 in an old wine warehouse with the original façade of the building being preserved: “Whenever we can we preserve old buildings, just as we have done in other stores such as the Fernão Magalhães store in Porto, the Vila do Conde store or the Bairro Azul store in Lisbon”, said a company spokesman.