Albert Heijn Logo PNG
Albert Heijn, the oldest supermarket chain in the Netherlands, was named after its founder, and established in 1887 in Oostzaan, Netherlands, starting as a small grocery store. The company rapidly expanded, introducing innovations like self-service supermarkets and private-label products. In the mid-20th century, it played a significant role in modernizing Dutch retail, focusing on quality, affordability, and customer experience.
Meaning and history
Albert Heijn is the largest and one of the oldest supermarket chains in the Netherlands, with a history dating back to 1887. Founded by Albert Heijn in the small town of Oostzaan, the chain began as a family-owned grocery store. Over the decades, it evolved into a national icon of Dutch retail, revolutionizing the way people shop for everyday groceries. Heijn’s vision was to provide high-quality products at affordable prices, a philosophy that helped the company expand rapidly throughout the 20th century.
Albert Heijn played a significant role in introducing modern supermarket concepts to the Netherlands, including self-service shopping, private-label products, and customer loyalty programs. The brand became synonymous with innovation, convenience, and quality. Its focus on fresh, local products, combined with international selections, has made it a favorite for Dutch consumers.
Today, Albert Heijn operates over a thousand stores across the Netherlands and Belgium, ranging from neighborhood shops to supermarkets. It is part of the multinational Ahold Delhaize group and continues to set trends in sustainability, product variety, and customer service. The brand’s familiar blue-and-white logo is a symbol of Dutch grocery shopping, offering everything from fresh produce to ready-made meals, while consistently adapting to the evolving needs of its customers.
What is Albert Heijn?
Albert Heijn is the name of the largest supermarket chain in the Netherlands, which is part of the Ahold Delhaize retail group. The brand was established in the 1880th, which also makes it one of the oldest European chains in this segment.
In terms of visual identity, Albert Heijn has quite an intense history, however, the current version of the chain’s logo was already adopted in the middle of the 20th century, with just small modifications made to it in 2006.
1920 – 1927
The Albert Heijn logo, created in 1920, was executed in quite a popular style for those years — an elegant script lettering, written in solid black lines against a plain white background. The inscription was set diagonally and underlined by a massive and sharp triangular element. The stroke was overlapped by a circular seal.
1927 – 1931
The redesign of 1927 has completely changed the concept of the Albert Heijn visual identity. Now it was a very sophisticated minimalistic AH monogram, inscribed into a thin circular frame. The “H” here replaced the historical bar of the enlarged “A” with a rounded peach and slightly curved side bars.
1931 – 1938
In 1931 the stylized monogram was replaced by a strong and stable uppercase wordmark written in a custom sans-serif typeface with straight bars and cuts of the lines. The black inscription with slightly narrowed contours of the characters was written on a plain background with no graphical additions.
1938 – 1940
The lettering on the Albert Heijn logo was rewritten in a new style in 1938. It was still an uppercase inscription but with the first characters of both parts enlarged. The contours of the letters got a bit wider, and their shapes — more modern. Another new thing in the logo was the “Voor Kwaliteit” tagline in small capitals.
1940 – 1956
The redesign of 1940 introduced a black-and-red circular banner with the massive geometric “AH” abbreviation, overlapped by a straight horizontal ribbon with the tagline inscribed on it in red narrowed capitals. This logo stayed with the company for more than 15 years.
1956 – 1966
In 1956 the chain of supermarkets received a new logo, executed again in the black-and-white color palette. The elegant white monogram with the elongated looped lines was written in white on a solid black badge with rounded angles. The top part of the banner was decorated with a classy traditional seal and a lowercase cursive tagline at the bottom.
1966 – 2006
The predecessor of today’s logo of the Albert Heijn chain was introduced already in 1966. It was a tender blue stylized monogram with the merged lowercase “A” and “H” sharing one vertical bar. The smooth contours of the characters were balanced by a sharp peak of this bar, pointing up, and symbolizing growth and progress.
2006 – Today
The redesign of 2006 has slightly refined the Albert Heijn logo, writing its stylized monogram in white against a solid blue background of a price tag banner with rounded angles and softened contours. The secondary version of the logo also has a small title case inscription with the full name of the company, written in blue against a white font.
Font and color
The modest title case lettering from the Albert Heijn logo is executed in a traditional sans-serif typeface with a lot of space between the characters. The closest fonts to the one, used in this insignia, are, probably, Myriadreg or SSTreg Thai, with some minor modifications.
As for the color palette of the Albert Heijn visual identity, it is based on a fresh and vivid combination of light blue and white, which is usually associated with reliability, professionalism, and excellence.
