Gottlieb Duttweiler aimed to create a direct bridge from producer to consumer, thereby able to offer a limited range of affordable products. To this end, he founded Migros in 1925 in Zürich, with the idea of selling just six basic foodstuffs at low prices to householders who, in those days, did not have ready access to markets of any kind.

From five lorries that he built into driving stores, at first he sold only coffee, rice, sugar, pasta, coconut fat and soap, driving from one village to another. His strategy of cutting the intermediate trade and their margins was met with strong resistance from his competitors, who convinced the producers to boycott him. As a reaction to this threat, Migros started producing its own line of goods. The beginning of a success story.