“Bucharest is a big city and I think we can continue to open stores,” said Eric Mazillier, chief executive officer of Decathlon Romania, who took the position about four years ago.
That will maybe happen in three or five years. The market is not mature enough at the moment for the company to consider it, he added.
The north of Bucharest, where Decathlon opened its latest store is the top shopping area of Romania, where people spend about half a billion euros on footwear, clothing, food and furniture a year.
Decathlon arrived in Romania in 2009 and has expanded cautiously so it now numbers 17 stores. It took it several years to find a suitable space in Baneasa to open its store and now the new store operates in a 3,900 square meter space rented from Mega Image, Mazillier said.
Decathlon ended last year with about 500 million lei (EUR110 million) revenue, its CEO said. This is means sales increased by 60% year-on-year, according to ZF’s calculations. Decathlon’s competitors on the sporting goods retail market are specialist retailers like Intersport and Hervis, single-brand stores like Nike and Adidas, as well as hypermarket and supermarket chains and online stores.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)