Axfood is a values-driven company. We strive to reflect the diversity of our customers and to be an inclusive employer. The different knowledge, skills, backgrounds, and perspectives of our employees create new opportunities and lead to better decisions. Diversity and gender equality contribute positively to our business.

Gender balance and broad international representation

Axfood works for a gender balance and a broad international representation among employees. Our group management is completely equal with as many women as men and we aim for 20 percent of the group's leaders to have an international background.

Research shows that the proportion of employees who are foreign-born increases as a larger proportion of managers have an international background. Therefore, it is important for us to reach our goal. In 2023, 17.8 percent of our leaders had an international background.

Diversity and inclusion

The Axfood Group should be an inclusive employer where everyone is treated with respect based on their conditions and where competence and potential are valued over demographic, cultural, and socio-economic differences.

To reduce exclusion in the Swedish labor market, Axfood is Sweden's largest private customer with Samhall. To reflect the diversity that exists in Sweden today, we also started Newcomer at Axfood in 2018. It was a paid apprenticeship program for newcomers with work in the store.

For increased inclusion, we also apply religion-neutral 'squeeze days', which means that it is up to the employee to decide when they want to take this type of leave.

Objective and fair recruitment processes

We work for increased diversity among employees by also ensuring objective and fair recruitment processes. Therefore, we use a recruitment tool that does not take into account, for example, name, age, and gender.

We train everyone who recruits for Axfood in diversity work and design our ads in an inclusive way. The tests used in the recruitment process can also be carried out in several languages.