Philippe Lejeune, the Frenchman who has been at the helm of Cora in Romania for ten years, intends to cover all Romanian counties within seven or eight years, which amounts to a radical change of strategy, given that in its over ten years of presence on the Romanian market the retailer has opened only five stores, three in Bucharest, and one in Cluj-Napoca and Baia Mare.
The retailer will hire 1,000 staff this year in the three stores
it is set to open in Constanța (Centrul Comercial City Park – City
Park Shopping Centre), Drobeta Turnu Severin and Arad (Centrul
Comercial Galleria – Galleria Shopping Centre). Cora has 3,500
employees at present. “Our policy is to open stores in cities, and
within the city, as close to the centre as possible, the locations
available are smaller. In addition, last year and this year we are
taking advantage of the opportunities we have had to open stores of
around 5,000 square metres in certain locations. Our strategy is to
open around 20 such stores in the future,” explains Philippe
Lejeune.
Last year the company started its expansion process after in 2009
it was the only player on the hypermarket segment whose turnover
expressed in RON fell from 1.47 billion RON in 2008 to 1.39 billion
RON at the end of 2009, according to Trade Registry data.