Supermarkets to take GFS beyond 70m euro

GFS Group last year made 50 million euro (1,620bn ROL) turnover in Romania, up from the 35 million euros the year before. GFS’ turnover will reach 70 million euros in 2003, that is 40% more than in 2002.
“Both last year’s and this year’s growth will be largely due to the development of Univers’all supermarket network business,” Razvan Petrovici, GFS Group general manager said.
The three Univers’all stores opened by GFS in Sibiu, Suceava and Targu Mures last year sold 270bn ROL’s (about 9 million euros) worth together. “The sales of these stores will go up to more than 700bn ROL (nearly 19 million euros) this year,” Petrovici estimates. The growth will be due to the fact that the three stores opened last year in April (Sibiu), October (Suceava) and November (Targu Mures) will be operational throughout the entire 2003. ” We are also planning to open three more stores this year, with at least one of them located in Bucharest,” Petrovici added. Univers’all’s initial strategy was to open stores only in smaller cities where purchasing power was above the average.
“We have successfully withstood competition from the international companies specialising in this field, such as XXL Mega Discount or Metro, which are our rivals in Sibiu, or Selgros in Targu Mures. We have come to the conclusion that we can open such stores in Bucharest, as well, where the purchasing power is twice higher than in any other area and there are three million potential buyers,” Petrovici said.
The investments in the three stores set to open this year are worth 12 million euros.
claudia.covaci@zf.ro ; ionut.bonoiu@zf.ro