Ahold Acquires Full Ownership of Its Polish Activities.

ZAANDAM, The Netherlands--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 2, 1998--Royal Ahold, the international food retailer, is to acquire full ownership of its joint venture in Poland. Agreement has been reached with co-owner Metro AG, Ahold's 50% partner in the joint venture, for Ahold to acquire all of the Ahold & Allkauf Polska Sp.z.o.o. shares held by Viehof GmbH, a Metro subsidiary. After completion of the transaction, activities in Poland will continue under the name Ahold Polska.

Ahold currently has 70 stores in Poland with a total average selling space of approximately 550,000 sq.ft. (about 55,000 m2). The stores are divided among three formats: supermarkets, hypermarkets and discount stores. Annualized sales amount to about NLG 350 million. Ahold employs about 2,300 people in Poland. Ahold's Polish activities are expanding swiftly. Ahold started out in Poland at the beginning of 1995 with German food retailer Allkauf, acquired by Metro earlier this year.

Ahold's Polish operation continues to be led by its Dutch president, Jan de Bruyn.

"We are now able to focus more fully on our strategy for Central Europe and our plans for Poland in particular," said Jan Andreae, Ahold Corporate Executive Board member responsible for all European activities. "Our mix of supermarkets, hypermarkets and discount stores has proved popular with the Polish consumer. It is a most interesting market with a population of more than 40 million, offering substantial opportunity for growth in the years ahead. This decision to go it alone in Poland is fully in line with our strategy and couldn't have come at a better moment."

Royal Ahold (Koninklijke Ahold nv) is a leading international food retailer with 1997 sales of approximately $26 billion and 3,200 stores and 220,000 associates worldwide. Ahold is the leading food retailer in The Netherlands, one of the top supermarket companies in the US, and has major operations in several countries in Southern and Central Europe, Latin America and Asia. In the United States, Ahold is prominent along the East Coast, operating the BI-LO, Giant Food Stores (including Edwards), Tops Markets (including Finast), and Stop & Shop companies encompassing over 830 stores. Upon completion of its acquisition of Giant Food Inc., expected within the next few weeks, Ahold will operate over 1000 stores along the eastern seaboard with annualized US sales approaching $20 billion.

In addition to its listing on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: AHO), Ahold's shares are trading on the Amsterdam Exchanges and on the Swiss Exchange, and Ahold options are also traded on the American Stock Exchange (AMEX). Ahold common shares may be accessed on the Reuter Equities 2000 Service under the symbol AHLN.AS and on Quotron under the symbol AHOLN.EU. Additional information is available on Ahold's home page: http://www.ahold.nl.