“I believe we may say that the total retail market remained constant. Modern retail grew up slightly because of the openings of new stores and acquisitions of local network, while traditional retail decline continued. The modern to traditional ratio is probably somewhere around 55% to 45% now,” says Adrian Comaneci, manager of market research company Contrast Management Consulting & Training. Comaneci includes all the 13 foreign companies operating on this market, even Metro Cash&Carry and Selgros in the modern retail category.
The information provided by Comaneci is just one of the estimates about the trend of the local retail. The National Statistics Institute data shows that the turnover in the retail trade, the most important indicator for consumer spending, fell by about three percent last year.
According to Contrast data, the market lost five billion euros compared with 2008 when it stood at EUR21 billion. The loss came from the traditional retail, which amounted to EUR14 billion at the time, compared with the EUR7 billion modern retail.
At the current 55% to 45% ratio of modern to traditional retail, modern retail rose from EUR7 billion to EUR8.8 billion compared with 2008, while traditional retail shrank to EUR7.2 billion.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)