Cardoen

What Cardoen does

Cardoen (legal entity NV DATOS, founded 1949 in Antwerp by Albert Cardoen) is Belgium's largest multi-brand car supermarket, operating 16 showrooms nationwide under a hybrid online-plus-physical distribution model. The company sells over 1,000 new and refurbished vehicles from 25+ brands, with a €100 refundable online reservation system and €259 flat-rate home delivery through logistics partner Hiflow. Its core technology differentiator is The Reconditioning Center (TRC), opened November 2021, where pre-owned vehicles undergo a five-stage refurbishment process with 100+ technical inspection points before sale with up to 10 years of warranty coverage.

Cardoen monetizes through a stacked revenue model: one-time vehicle sales (new and refurbished) form the core, supplemented by recurring and transactional streams — Cardoen Finance car loans (originated via Alpha Credit, with consumer-credit pricing starting at 5.99% APR), Cardoen Lease private leasing (5-year balloon contracts bundling maintenance and warranty), Cardoen Insurance (third-party liability, omnium, driver, legal assistance), Service+ maintenance contracts (€39–€53/month for up to 7 years / 150,000 km), extended warranty (€599 for up to 10 years), and roadside Assistance via Touring. Trade-in and recycling premiums (€1,000 for running cars, €500 for non-runners) feed a C2B pipeline that replenishes refurbished inventory. The customer base is overwhelmingly individual consumers (13,000+ annually) plus a secondary self-employed/SMB segment served through the "Company Cars" category.

Since 2018, Cardoen has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Aramis Group, a Paris-headquartered European online used-car platform operating across six countries (Belgium, France, Spain, UK, Austria, Italy) under separate brands. The Group describes itself as a European leader in online used-car sales, "selling a car every minute." Within Belgium, Cardoen pioneered Chinese car brands (2006) and became the exclusive Belgian distributor for Chinese EV brand Aiways in 2021. Operational milestones include the 1992 move to the 7,500 m² Wilrijk flagship, expansion of the Walloon footprint to five locations by 2018, launch of home delivery in 2020, and the January 2022 opening of Belgium's first public hydrogen refueling station on-site with DATS 24. The company celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2024.

Name

Cardoen

Legal name

NV DATOS

Website

https://cardoen.be

Company type

Private

Founded year

1949

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

251–500 employees

Short description

Cardoen is Belgium's largest multi-brand car supermarket, operating 16 showrooms that sell 1,000+ new and refurbished vehicles from 25+ brands to over 13,000 individual consumers and SMBs per year, bundled with in-house finance, leasing, insurance, warranty, and maintenance services.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

Antwerpen

HQ country

Belgium

HQ region

Europe

Offices17 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Operations, Supply Chain, Personnel, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales, Technology or R&D

Revenue model

1. Vehicle Sales: Sale of new and refurbished/pre-owned vehicles from 25+ brands. Cars are sold directly to consumers through showrooms and online platform. Price points range from budget to premium segments.
2. Cardoen Finance - Car Loan: Classic car loan allowing purchase in installments with fixed monthly payments. Deposit or trade-in required. Provided in partnership with Alpha Credit.
3. Cardoen Lease - Private Leasing: Balloon financing with included maintenance (Service+), 5-year warranty, and free roadside assistance. Fixed monthly fee with option to return car or pay remaining sum after 5 years.
4. Cardoen Insurance: Auto insurance products including civil liability, omnium, driver insurance, and legal assistance. Offered as ancillary product to car buyers.
5. Service+ Maintenance Contract: Fixed monthly fee covering all maintenance costs, technical repairs, roadside assistance, replacement vehicle, and free tyre swap. Available for new and nearly new cars less than 4 years old.
6. Home Delivery: Fixed fee home delivery service (€259) through Hiflow partner, including car demonstration.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels6 records

Core offering

Cardoen operates a Belgian multi-brand car supermarket chain, selling new and refurbished vehicles from more than 25 brands through 16 showrooms and a transactional website. Around the core vehicle sale, Cardoen bundles financing, private leasing, insurance, maintenance contracts, roadside assistance, home delivery, and a trade-in service so that a customer can complete the full ownership lifecycle in one place.

Product overview

Cardoen is a Belgian multi-brand car supermarket operating 16 showrooms across Belgium, offering a unified platform for buying, financing, insuring, maintaining, and selling cars. The core offering is its car sales platform (new and refurbished/second-hand vehicles from 25+ brands), supported by integrated financial services (Cardoen Finance for loans, Cardoen Lease for private leasing with bundled maintenance), insurance products (Cardoen Insurance), and workshop services (Cardoen Service+ maintenance contracts, Service Center, Assistance). Additional services include home delivery, online reservation with refundable deposits, and a trade-in program. The company positions itself around the lowest-price guarantee and its proprietary refurbishment process at The Reconditioning Center, with vehicles covered by warranties from 1 year (standard refurbished) to 10 years (extended). Cardoen is part of the European Aramis Group.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• New and refurbished car sales Multi-brand new and refurbished vehicle sales across 25+ marques, available through 16 Belgian showrooms and the cardoen.be online configurator, targeting individual consumers and small businesses.
• Cardoen Finance (car loan) In-house vehicle financing solution allowing customers to spread the purchase price over fixed monthly payments when buying a car from Cardoen.
• Cardoen Private Lease Private leasing program that lets customers drive a new vehicle for a fixed monthly fee without owning the asset, suitable for consumers and self-employed buyers.
• Cardoen Warranty (extended warranty up to 10 years) Extended warranty protection on refurbished vehicles, tied to the 100+ point inspection process, covering mechanical breakdown beyond the standard guarantee.
• Cardoen Service+ (maintenance contract) Maintenance contract covering routine servicing of the purchased vehicle, bundled at point of sale to lock in predictable ownership costs.
• Cardoen Insurance Vehicle insurance products arranged through Cardoen at the point of sale, providing coverage continuity from the first day of ownership.
• Cardoen Assistance (roadside assistance) Roadside assistance service that supports customers in case of breakdown or incident, bundled with the vehicle purchase.
• Home delivery service Delivery of the purchased vehicle directly to the customer's home, operated via a partnership with logistics provider Hiflow, removing the need to visit the showroom.
• Sell your car (trade-in) Trade-in service where customers can sell their current vehicle to Cardoen, with the valuation offset against the price of their next purchase.
• Cardoen Service Center Service center network performing maintenance and repair work for vehicles sold by Cardoen, supporting the post-sale ownership experience.

Quantifiable outcome

• 13,000+ customers served annually
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers1 record

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature1 record

Partnerships

Five partnerships are on record, tiered minor and core.

• DATS 24minorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2022Opened Belgium's first public hydrogen refueling station at Cardoen facility on Boomsesteenweg in Wilrijk (January 2022).
• AiwaysminorChannel Partner/ Reseller/ Distributor · 1 January 2021Exclusive distributor of Aiways brand in Belgium since 2021. Aiways is a Chinese brand making fully electric, affordable SUVs.
• ColruytminorChannel Partner/ Reseller/ Distributor · 1 January 2002First in Europe to partner with a major food distribution company (Colruyt). Continues to be a successful partnership for Cardoen.
• HiflowcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerLeader in car delivery services in Belgium. Professional drivers deliver cars from Cardoen showrooms to customer addresses. Partnership enables home delivery service at fixed rate.
• TouringminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerBreakdown and accident assistance provider. Cardoen Assistance customers can contact Touring for 24/7 roadside help throughout Europe.

Scale indicators6 records

Recent moves10 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Others

• BCA Marketplace: Europe's leading vehicle remarketing and auction group, providing wholesale supply that ultimately feeds Cardoen's 1,000+ car inventory. An adjacent supplier rather than a direct retail competitor, but a key ecosystem participant in the used-car value chain.

Broad incumbents

• CarMax: Largest US used-car retailer with omnichannel (showroom + online) operations, proprietary reconditioning standards, and extended warranties. Highly comparable multi-brand supermarket model, albeit at significantly greater scale.
• Carvana: Pure-play online used-car retailer with home delivery and vertically integrated reconditioning. Comparable to Cardoen's online reservation + Hiflow home-delivery offering, though with a far heavier digital-only cost structure.
• AutoScout24: Europe's largest online car marketplace. Functions both as a discovery channel Cardoen competes against for attention and a lead-generation partner for its dealer listings; comparable in pan-European reach but with a marketplace rather than retail model.

Direct peers

• Heycar: European online marketplace for certified used cars backed by OEMs (VW, BMW, Mercedes, Ford). Competes with Cardoen on selection transparency and brand-backed warranty in the same consumer segment.
• Reezocar: French online used-car aggregator/retailer with home delivery and a 14-day return policy — overlapping closely with Cardoen's omnichannel promise and refundable-reservation mechanic, including into Belgium via cross-border delivery.
• Auto1 Group: Europe's leading digital platform for used-car sales with reconditioning centers (Autohero) operating across multiple EU countries. Directly comparable to Cardoen's TRC-led refurbished-car playbook and multi-country omnichannel model.
• Spoticar: Stellantis's European certified-used-vehicle program with online and dealer-network sales. Comparable to Cardoen in multi-brand used-car retail, warranty-backed inventory, and pan-European footprint.
• CarSupermarket: Aramis Group's UK multi-brand used-car supermarket brand. Same group, similar multi-brand supermarket positioning as Cardoen in Belgium, offering a peer template for marketing, inventory, and customer-acquisition strategy.
• Clicars: Aramis Group's Spanish online used-car brand and Cardoen's sister company, operating the same digital recondition-and-resell model. Useful benchmark for Cardoen's unit economics and playbook portability across Southern Europe.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/pages/Cardoen/179309902160776
• Xx.com/cardoen

Compliance1 record

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Cardoen