Pavăl, Dedeman: If we had more entrepreneurs, the crisis would not have hurt us this badly

DIY store chain Dedeman, founded by Bacău businessman Dragoș Pavăl, 44, could reach over 300 million euros in turnover this year, considering that the company’s owner says the 15% turnover growth target “has long been exceeded”.

After a year 2009 with 252 million euros in revenues, Dedeman is set to become the biggest player on the DIY market, leaving Praktiker behind, following an aggressive expansion plan carried out in full crisis.
Dedeman has invested around 100 million euros in nine new stores in the past two years. The chain now has 21 stores, with another three to five stores scheduled to open in 2011.
How has a Romanian executive managed to expand his business in times of crisis?
“Fortunately, we acted as if there were a crisis at all times. When the crisis started, we looked at the organisational chart because we saw it was a common thing to do. We examined it and started to evaluate the situation: we could not fire anyone. We’ve streamlined our activity constantly,” Pavăl said.
Other players put investments on hold and it took time for them to reorganise and calculate their losses. Some believe it is mature to be more conservative at present. Pavăl has adopted the model currently pursued by Cora, Kaufland and Decathlon, which make new acquisitions more or less on a monthly basis.
Whilst in food and clothing retail, foreigners now call the shots, on the DIY market and in electronics & home appliances retail, Romanians have managed to stay on top.
“If Romania had more entrepreneurs, the crisis would not have been felt as strongly. I am talking about entrepreneurs who do less TV shows and more for their companies and who do not become involved in several businesses at the same time. You cannot run 20 businesses in parallel,” adds Pavăl, who is also involved in the Dedeman Trucks business (transport for the store chain) and Dedeman Automobile (Dacia-Nissan dealer in Bacău county).