The company will thus continue to expand at the same pace as last year and plans to keep going at the same rate to reach 400 stores in eight to ten years. The retailer usually takes this store format to cities of more than 10,000 people.
“We are expanding at this rate (so slow i.e.) because we develop the stores ourselves. The group owns about 60% of its stores and rents the rest. In our case the percentage of stores we own is much higher because Romania hardly has any standard store developers,” explains Daniel Gross in his first interview, after having only spoken to the media during news conferences before.
Penny Market chooses standard stores that it can arrange up to the standards of the group and are easy to supply by 40-ton trucks.
“We are more efficient this way and can remain a discount store chain.”
The only two retailers on this segment in Romania are Lidl and Penny Market.
Penny Market stores usually have an 831 square meter retail area.
Penny Market has about 200 stores in Romania, 21 of which opened last year and four this week. The company built 25 stores in 2016 but opened four of them in 2017.
“The number of new stores we open in one year is subject to construction permits. This is the most important factor. Things went somewhat better in the second half of last year.”
The German-held retailer invests about EUR80 million in expansion in Romania, using local profit and funds from the group, without borrowing anything from banks.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)