REMA 1000 creates a blueprint for culture-led Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness

Overview

REMA 1000, a Norwegian discount grocery brand with nearly 700 franchise stores and part of Reitan Retail, built a culture-led governance foundation using Microsoft 365 E5 to unify Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive before rolling out Microsoft 365 Copilot. By 2025, all administrative employees had completed Microsoft Teams training and exceeded the company's 70% security knowledge benchmark. Employees now use Microsoft Copilot Chat to summarize discussions and retrieve information; one regional marketing manager described using Copilot to catch up on missed Teams channel activity after a sick day in about two minutes. The rollout reduced security risk and shadow IT by centralizing collaboration and AI usage within the Microsoft 365 tenant.

The challenge

Across REMA 1000's large, distributed organization, information lived in multiple places, ownership could be unclear, and collaboration practices varied from team to team, making it harder to share knowledge, maintain consistency and unlock the value of digital investments. REMA 1000 had already invested in Microsoft 365 E5 but was not yet using it to its full extent, and saw growing interest in AI but lacked a unified, governed approach.

The solution

REMA 1000 built a culture-led governance foundation using Microsoft 365 E5 to unify Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, OneNote and Planner around standardized, secure collaboration structures with embedded governance. Using capabilities within Microsoft 365 E5, including Microsoft Defender, REMA 1000 strengthened protections across identities, devices, applications and cloud workloads. The organization invested heavily in training grounded in real-world scenarios to build employee digital confidence and capability ahead of Microsoft 365 Copilot rollout.

Reported business value

By 2025, all administrative employees had completed Microsoft Teams training and exceeded the company's security knowledge benchmark of 70%. The rollout reduced security risk and shadow IT by centralizing collaboration and AI usage within the Microsoft 365 tenant, delivered more consistent collaboration across the service organization, regional teams and franchise stores, and strengthened trust in data and digital tools. Employees now use Microsoft Copilot Chat to summarize discussions and retrieve information — one regional marketing manager described catching up on missed Teams channel activity in about two minutes after returning from a day's sick leave.