We have the same in France. The first big "big surface" stores were named supermarché, then we got hypermarché and the funniest is that now we have superette, a small surface store, branded like the super/hyper but within the city center.
The "ette" French suffix is to reduce the main word.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diminutive
> A diminutive is a word obtained by modifying a root word to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment, and sometimes to belittle something or someone.
Yeah, it's funny, a word consisting both of an augmentative (the opposite of diminutive) and a diminutive.
Were you thinking of „Verkleinerungsform“? Do people still use those Germanized terms? It feels a little old-fashioned to me, like saying „besitzanzeigendes Fürwort“ instead of Possessivpronomen.
In a way? I always found it more sensible to use German words like "Namenwort" instead of "Nomen" to express German grammar, instead of using latin terms. After all Latin is a language that comes from a completely different language family to start with and is not used at all in Germany except when wanting to pretend you're fancy (law, medicine, grammar).
I now accept that I am losing my French while not being really fluent in any other language.
I think we visited a few of those when we had a family holiday to France last year. They seemed really nice.
So it make sense to have a superette in the corner of the street that offer everyday goods while an hypermarché have clothing, DIY materials, big appliances, etc. on sale..
Most supermarkets that are big enough are in fact "hypermarkets" nowadays.
A "superette" is a small supermarket.
Also, while we're digging Wikipedia: the French one points to the national statistic institute that have a definition of an hypermarket as "non specialized store that's over 2 500 m^2 in surface and make more than a third of their revenue from food".