“Sales of notebooks have gone up by some 30% considering more and more companies are buying laptops to give to their employees so they could work from home. (…),” says Flanco CEO Dragos Sirbu.
Video games consoles are seeing an even higher growth rate, 40% to 50%, mostly purchased because of the kids who are now at home due to school closing. Sales of TVs are also up by 15% to 20% after no growth in the previous months, the executive added.
“People are going back to [watching] TV channels now; the audience is rising.”
On the other hand, sales of large home appliances went down, as did sales of mobile phones, especially smartphones. Purchases of large home appliances seen as investments have been put on hold, as people are buying things only if they really need to, Dragos Sirbu said.
Small home appliances are a different matter, though.
“The market of bread makers is on the rise after two years, but sales of personal care products are dropping.”
Flanco has been in business since 1994 and is now held by Iulian Stanciu. It posted growth of 13% in sales to RON1.21 billion last year. It ended 2019 with 156 stores opened in 116 cities in Romania, after having inaugurated 30 and closed seven.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)